Baylyblog: Out of our minds too...

Baylyblog has moved: come visit our new home...

Tim Bayly — Thu, 20 Jul 2017 17:59:07 +0000

Baylyblog has changed its name and moved.

For the latest content, head on over to Out of Our Minds at Warhorn Media.

I don't know why you say goodbye, I say hello...

Tim Bayly — Mon, 17 Jul 2017 22:51:34 +0000

Dear readers,

I have a couple important announcements about some serious changes taking place, and what's coming next...

First, a few months back, Jake Mentzel and Nathan Alberson of Warhorn Media sat down with me and we ended up talking for hours about homosexuality. The result is an eight-episode season of a new podcast called The World We Made. I hope you'll download the first episode. Listen, subscribe, and share.

That podcast will air right up until the release of my new book about homosexuality called The Grace of Shame (also releasing from Warhorn Media) which I know many of you are excited about and have been supportive of. Thank you so much for all of your help! I couldn’t have completed it without your encouragement and support.

Second, and maybe most significant for longtime Baylyblog readers…

Some of you may remember Baylyblog began back on March 4, 2004 as a World Magazine blog titled “Out of Our Minds, Too.” World’s owner, Joel Belz, was a longtime family friend and I had worked with Joel and World’s editor and his wife, Marvin and Susan Olasky, in opposing gender neutered Bibles. So when Marvin called to suggest the blog, it seemed like a good fit and a good work.

The opportunity the internet presents us today is similar to the opportunity the printing press presented the Reformers five centuries ago. The Reformers used the printing press to do many things, but especially to pamphleteer, bypassing Rome and going directly to the people. The internet allowed us to bypass the stranglehold the Evangelical and Reformed establishment had on the church in North America. The legacy publishers gnashed their teeth at this threat to their longtime monopoly, and continue to do so, but the battle has been won and the prophetic ministry of local pastors in local churches is no longer dependent upon magazines and brick-and-mortar publishers seeing money in it for themselves.

Baylyblog’s title was originally “Out of Our Minds, Too.” Dad had written a monthly column called “Out of My Mind” which ran in Tenth Presbyterian’s "Eternity Magazine” for twenty-five years, so I asked my brother David to write with me and we stole the name from Dad. After a couple years we moved on from World. World's editorial voice was incompatible with historic Reformed orthodoxy, so we began to host the blog ourselves renaming it Baylyblog.

Now it’s time for another change.

For the last several years I’ve grown in my desire and commitment to write books. This is something our other Clearnote pastors and the elders of Clearnote Church, Bloomington had been pushing me to do for the past fifteen years, but until a year ago, it hadn’t happened.

Then we released the book on fatherhood, God’s and ours, on Father’s Day 2016, titling it Daddy Tried. I hope you’ve read it. If you haven’t, please do. Please get your sons and the fathers and sons of your church to read it. A number of sisters and mothers have read it and appreciated it also, although the book is written for men. If you’ve read it, please post a review on Amazon. We are very limited in getting the word out about the book since legacy publishers haven’t been willing to touch our work. As one CEO of a well-known Evangelical publisher said to me, “Tim, we are not interested in publishing you because you opposed our [gender neutered Bible translation]."

There is a cost to defending the faith against those inside the church with all the money and fame who own the publishing companies and don’t like criticism. But you can help us bear that cost by talking up and buying and reviewing Daddy Tried. Would you please help us get the word out about this book? I get no royalties from it. I signed them over to Warhorn Media. Thank you for your help on this.

Now we have another book ready, and we’re already planning the next book.

As my focus on writing books increases, maintaining this site on my own has grown more difficult, and even distracting. We’ve been arguing about what to do about the pressure of maintaining the blog for some time now, and you’ll recall our decision to remove comments several months ago. In part, that decision was to relieve the pressure I was under to moderate and respond to all the comments.

Also, Baylyblog is long overdue for a redesign. Or rather a total overhaul, and that would be expensive and time-consuming. We’ve fantasized about putting Baylyblog to death, but it doesn’t seem right to do so now.

Instead, we’ve decided to pull the trigger on another solution. Baylyblog is getting a name change and a new place to live.

Let me explain.

Warhorn Media is the new home, and the new title for the blog will be the old title, Out of Our Minds. Warhorn Media is also the home of our new podcast, The World We Made. We hope you will follow along over at Out of Our Minds for future episodes.

I’m excited about these changes. Out of Our Minds will work like a site within a site. I will continue writing on all the things I write about here, but I won’t have to worry about keeping the site floating. Warhorn will take care of that.

Warhorn has an established platform with people already performing all the various tasks that have also needed to be done on Baylyblog (technical maintenance, graphic design, social media engagement, etc.). Warhorn has already been the home of our books and podcasts, along with the Psalms project of My Soul Among Lions and many other works that are dear to my heart.

So it all makes sense. My work has long been part of Warhorn Media, although it’s likely you didn’t know it. I want to build the ministry of the younger men and women who have served me so faithfully all these years. Here at Clearnote Church our beloved Pastor Max Curell likes to remind us that form should follow function, and hence this change.

What can you expect from Out of Our Minds at Warhorn Media?

The same things you’ve come to expect from Baylyblog when it stood alone. I’ll still do most of the writing and editing of “Out of Our Mind’s” content, although we’re hoping a number of other men and women will also contribute content. This content will usually be aimed at church leaders, but also regular folks working to sort out God’s will for the church and world today. We’re hoping most of our faithful Baylyblog readers will find the changes mostly cosmetic in nature.

The past thirteen years of content hosted here will not disappear. Although we don't have a finalized plan, you can rest assured it will remain online. For now, it will remain right where it is.

Please pray that this move will allow us to unify and strengthen our efforts, as we hope.

So come on over and join us at Out of Our Minds for the continuation of this work each of you dear readers have made such a joy for me over the last thirteen years. You're already familiar with my writing. Here's a taste of the audio content we will be releasing in the coming weeks.

Have I mentioned you should subscribe?

Now then, this is the last post on Baylyblog. This blog (to paraphrase John Cleese) is no more, has ceased to be. Bereft of life, it rests in peace. This is an ex-blog.

Love,

Tim

Tags:

Announcements

Warhorn Media

Seeing the threat to his royalties, Eugene Peterson finesses things—making things worse...

Tim Bayly — Thu, 13 Jul 2017 23:03:57 +0000

Now the Washington Post reports Eugene Peterson is having second thoughts about whether or not he himself (at 84 and retired from the pastorate) would actually in the final analysis really and truly go ahead and officiate at a sodomite wedding. Tough question that one—especially when one considers the filthy lucre at stake.

Which is a lot. Of money, that is. The Post reports:

Eugene Peterson, who is best known for “The Message” Bible translation, set off a firestorm this week when he said in an interview with Religion News Service that he would be willing to conduct a same-sex marriage. In response, LifeWay Christian Resources, the publishing arm of the Southern Baptist Convention, said it was prepared to stop selling Peterson’s books.

A threat to royalties can have a profound impact on a pastor.

Predictably, this financial threat to Eugene Peterson didn't produce true repentance, but only further conniving betrayals of God, His Word, and His sheep...

Peterson said:

To clarify, I affirm a biblical view of marriage: one man to one woman. I affirm a biblical view of everything.

Actually, no, Mr. Peterson; you do not affirm a Biblical view of everything. For instance, take the entire interview from which you are now trying to retract one particular statement. The interview contained statement after statement that was contrary to Scripture.

Also, Mr. Peterson, take this statement you go on to make in your retraction. It boggles the mind how any man who feared God and served as shepherd of God's sheep could say such a thing:

if I were pastoring today and if a gay couple were Christians of good faith and if they asked me to perform their wedding ceremony—if, if, if. Pastors don’t have the luxury of indulging in hypotheticals. And to be honest, no is not a word I typically use.

Then this sickening doubletalk:

When I told this reporter that there are gay and lesbian people who “seem to have as good a spiritual life as I do,” I meant it. But then again, the goodness of a spiritual life is functionally irrelevant in the grand scheme of things.

And this half-hearted apology which takes back with the word "bombast" what it tried to give with the words "I regret." What he really regrets is not so much his own words as the bombastic response of others.

I regret the confusion and bombast that this interview has fostered.

* * *

BTW, in the comments under the original interview of Peterson by Merritt published by Religious News Service, Jesus People USA feminist Jon Trott comes out in favor of sodomite marriage. He says that those who like that sort of thing should be able to have that thing that they like:

I still hew conservative (to a degree) on sexual issues, though support gay marriage as a matter of loving my neighbor enough to allow them their own choices.

What a terrible betrayal of God's Word Jon Trott has given the world as one of the main legacies of Jesus People USA. Old commune hippies often go rank separated from the Word of God and the Church. Jon says his sexual rebellion is inspired by Jesus. Like all the rest of them, he lies.

Tags:

Check out My Soul Among Lions's Summer Psalm Series...

Joseph Bayly — Thu, 13 Jul 2017 19:40:32 +0000

If you're not following My Soul Among Lions on Facebook, you might not know that they've been livestreaming a new song each Tuesday night at 8pm as they work their way from Psalm 21 to Psalm 30 in preparation for their next album this Fall.

Clearnote Bloomington has had the pleasure of being led in worship with these songs each Sunday morning, followed by a sermon on the same Psalm. They're calling it the Summer Psalm Series.

Everybody else can listen to the sermons here, and catch the songs on Facebook. Here's the livestream of Psalm 25 from this past Tuesday night, and the corresponding sermon.

Follow My Soul Among Lions's Summer Psalm Series on FB. Put it down on your calendar for next Tuesday at 8pm. Then again the next Tuesday and so on...

Here in Cincinnati, we've made it a family tradition just before bed. The kids love it, and it's so strengthening to me in my work as a pastor.

Tags:

The World We Made: Coming soon...

Jake Mentzel — Thu, 13 Jul 2017 15:12:41 +0000

UPDATE: There’s been lots of interest in this podcast, with about 2000 listens from 30 countries and counting! If you haven’t subscribed yet, we’ve added a few links to make it easier for those of you who aren’t on iTunes, which is most of you. (Welcome non-Apple fanboys.) Don't miss an episode. Scroll down and subscribe now.

"These are the confessions of American Christians recovering from American Christianity. This is the world we made."

Warhorn Media is pleased to announce a new podcast hosted by Jake Mentzel and Nathan Alberson and featuring Tim Bayly. The World We Made is designed to help ordinary American Christians think through the difficult issues we face in our culture today. Season 1 is about homosexuality.

Over the course of the first season, we talk with Tim about how we went from having anti-sodomy laws in all 50 states (just 50 years ago) to where we are today. What are the changes Tim has seen in his lifetime? What exactly do they mean? What part did the culture play and what part did the church play? How are regular Bible-believing Christians supposed to respond? What has Tim learned as a pastor to help equip us for the challenge of ministering to men and women tempted by homosexuality?

These are the questions we'll be unpacking over the course of eight 20-minute episodes. We'll start out slow and easy, and things will pick up steam as we get closer and closer to the end. You won't want to miss it, so check out the trailer (above), and go ahead and subscribe now in iTunes or Android (or wherever you listen to your podcasts—Google Play Music, Stitcher, TuneIn, RSS feed) so you're ready when the first episode drops (July 17).

The public shame of Eugene Peterson...

Tim Bayly — Wed, 12 Jul 2017 15:50:30 +0000

A friend just sent me this link to a recent interview Jonathan Merritt of Religious News Service did with eighty-four year old IVP and NavPress author, Regent prof, and pastor, Eugene Peterson. This particular excerpt has to do with sodomy, lesbianism, and sodomite marriage. Peterson says he's OK with them all.

My friend writes, "As one formed by Intervarsity in the late 80s/early 90s, I see one "esteemed " teacher after another have no courage."

He's speaking euphemistically. This is no mere lack of courage, but utter apostasy. In other words, this man will never enter the Kingdom of God.

One might hope the things Peterson says are the product of early stages of dementia if only they didn't perfectly reflect everything I've known of Inter-Varsity and its press for decades now. How any Christian continues to give money in support of this organization and its employees is...

beyond me. How any true Christian continues to work as an employee of Inter-Varsity or its publisher is beyond me.

Under Merritt's interview of Peterson, I left this comment:

This is appalling. On every level, and both interviewer and interviewee. "Cease to exist?" Is this what Jesus said—man merely ceases to exist? Then Peterson himself: what sort of shepherd doesn't bother to warn the lesbians he's visiting that, unless they repent of their sexual perversion, they will not inherit the Kingdom of God (1Corinthians 6)? As the son of the former publisher of IVP and a pastor ordained in Peterson's denomination, I am ashamed of his betrayal of his calling and ordination vows; but worse, his shame at the Name and words of Jesus Christ. With love,

Since before Mary Lee and I lived in Madison and went to church and small group with Inter-Varsity leaders (at the time, Dad was on I-V's board), Inter-Varsity has been leading Evangelicals in their rebellion against God's Word concerning all things sexual. Their false witness has been wicked here in Bloomington and is so around the world. That their best-selling author Eugene Peterson has long been in favor of sodomy and says he'd do sodomite marriages is not due to any lack of courage.

Like all Inter-Varsity people, such shame at the Name and words of Jesus is a cornerstone of their lives and witness. It's what they have built their so-called "ministry" on.

Eugene Peterson is their hoary-headed spokesman.

Again, the lesson is: have nothing to do with the famous Christians all men speak well of. Our Savior warned us they are always bad:

But woe to you who are rich, for you are receiving your comfort in full. Woe to you who are well-fed now, for you shall be hungry. Woe to you who laugh now, for you shall mourn and weep. Woe to you when all men speak well of you, for their fathers used to treat the false prophets in the same way. (Luke 6:24-26)

Tags:

What a little girl does with a reconnaissance-by-artillery weaponized water balloon launcher...

Tim Bayly — Wed, 12 Jul 2017 13:44:11 +0000

Grandmother is a missionary to the Congo and is home for a visit to help with the care of her grandchildren (whom Mary Lee and I share with her). Unbeknownst to her, I had cast a longing eye at these reconnaissance-by-artillery weaponized water balloon launchers on sale at Sam's Club a couple weeks ago. (I've been reading We Were Soldiers Once...and Young: Ia Drang - The Battle That Changed the War in Vietnam, so you know my frame of mind.)

Well, all that to say that my children's missionary Grandmother had the same idea and actually bought the thing. But having spent much of her life in the Congo where death, mayhem, and poison-tipped pygmy blowgun darts are as much a part of life as...

earth, wind, and fire, she didn't give the reconnaissance-by-artillery weaponized water balloon launchers to her eldest grandson, but his older sister. Her one concession to girlhood was to give her the pink one.

Her precious granddaughter outwitted her devious grandmother's efforts to subvert sugar and spice and all things nice. No butch warriorism for her, thank you very much!

Dear sweet Aubrielle knew precisely what to do with the whole shebang—especially the accompanying ammunition. She carried the front porch wicker table down the steps and fifteen yards over to the scrub saplings where, with a little help from flowers and a vase and assorted other accoutrements (including three hundred-gallon trash cans and a dilapidated mailbox), she turned her mortar shells into Christmas tree balls daintily hung as background to her own shrine to all that is beautiful and lovely; to all that gives joy to a vacationing seven year old girrrrll.

Tags:

Femininity & modesty

James Comey big and strong...

Tim Bayly — Tue, 11 Jul 2017 00:10:54 +0000

Before this news cycle is completely over, may I just say that Mr. Comey is one of the more pathetic government bureaucrats I've had occasion to witness in my sixty-three years. The juxtaposition of his towering size and manly presentation with his pathetic...

scaredy-cat mea-culpa (I'm sorry I'm so weak) response (twice!) to Senator Dianne Feinstein in a hearing before the Senate Intelligence Committee is a moment worth remembering until we die.

Beyond pathetic. If this is the man who led the FBI for years, imagine the effeminate culture that prevailed among the FBI male agents during his directorate.

If Comey had simply said, "I failed," I would have respected him for it. Saying "I failed" is manly. Every man understands and is ready to forgive.

Instead, confronted by a woman, he pleaded weakness. How awful is that?

Comey did precisely what Feinstein suggested he do. Before he said he wished he'd been stronger, oozing a false sympathy, she laid it all out for him. She spoke of the intimidation factor of the oval office while pointing to his bigness and strongness.

Tags:

Politics

Manhood

A few of my favorite things (1)...

Tim Bayly — Mon, 10 Jul 2017 19:23:44 +0000

It's summertime, so how 'bout a little diversion? Mary Lee and I get quite a bit of joy out of God's good earth and its lawns, bushes, trees, and gardens. Mary Lee does the perennial gardens, I cut the grass, and we both work on the other stuff (fruit trees, roses, berries, vegetables, etc.) Here then are a few of our favorite things.

Arbor Day: over the years, we've planted about 150 bare root trees and shrubs purchased from Arbor Day. The trees are inexpensive. If you take out a membership, you can buy shrubs and trees for between $5 and $10. Some of their trees are available in bulk, 50 for $40. At this price, I don't get all tense about keeping them alive, so somewhere less than half survive a full year. But that's many trees and bushes so that, by now, our yard has lots of trees and bushes that started as tiny whips. A few are over fifteen feet tall now. We've planted red oak, red maple, magnolia, sawtooth oak, cherry, apple...

peach, lilac, forsythia, weeping willow, thuja green giant, boxwood, azalea, and several kinds of evergreen shrubs.

Nourse Farms: raspberries are Mary Lee's favorite thing in the world and both of us love asparagus. We have about sixty feet of four varieties of raspberries and about ten asparagus plants of two varieties—all from Nourse. Yummy!

Heirloom Roses: we love roses, but since we're in a very hot and humid area, non-heirloom roses don't do so well. Black spot is constant, so rather than spraying all the time, we now buy disease-resistant roses from Heirloom. Wonderfully beautiful! No more spindly testimonies to my lack of discipline spraying them with these babies. And what beauties sit in our bud vases in the kitchen and dining room! Honestly, after growing up with dozens of rose bushes from Jackson Perkins, all hybrid teas, I've come to like the appearance of the non-hybrids even better. (We added the rose CL Iceberg pictured at the top of the post to our garden this year.)

Swan Island Dahlias: the Manchester by the Sea estate I worked on as a gardener while I was in seminary was out on Smith's Point overlooking Lobster Cove and it had a formal rose and dahlia garden beautifully cared for by the godly older man I was privileged to work beside, Enoch. So in memory of that garden and its master gardener, Enoch, we have a few dahlias. I'm no Enoch, though, so our dahlias are pathetic.

Perennials: speaking for myself, I'm partial to clematis (we pronounce it "cleMATis" and it climbs our fence and mailbox), poppies (my favorite perennial), columbine, wisteria (smell), honeylocust (smell), and bleeding heart.

Tire swings: we used to have two tire swings hanging from thirty or so feet of heavy rope tied in the high branches of one majestic elm tree. Then tragedy struck. One spring the bark exploded and two weeks later our elm was dead. We still have a couple swings, but nothing like what we used to have. Now the swings are kids-play, but the tire swings were man-play. Hanging from the same tree and rope thick enough to hold 700 pounds, we had swing battles. Dude! Almost as good as M-80s, potato guns, and carbide canons.

Fruit trees: we have a peach tree, cherry tree, and a couple apple trees—all planted bare root. Sadly, we have yet to pick fruit from any of them. The last two years we've had hundreds of acorn-size peaches growing, but before they ripen, a combination of natural fruit drop and racoons clean them off and we don't end up getting even a single peach. This year we'll be getting some apples, though.

Felco 2 Pruning Shears: we love our thirty-year-old Felco No. 2. I sharpened the blade recently with this handy tool. The leather holster is a nice add-on. Check out the reviews. It's rare you'll find 829 reviewers all giving a tool five-stars.

Ferris 3200Z ZTR Mower: cutting acres and acres of very rough ground, we love our Ferris mower. We chose the Vanguard V-Twin engine. It was a good choice since, at the time, the Kawasakis were throwing rods. Between our neighbor's grass, Doug and Heather's grass, our grass, the grass along the side of the road out of our tiny subdivision, and the grass out by the state highway, we cut around fifteen acres a week. My son-in-law, Doug, and I share the ownership of the mower and split the gas and parts and repairs. (That is, unless one of us is really stupid as I was recently when I bent one of the wheel supports and paid for the repair myself.)

European style SEP Walking Tractor: years ago, we bought an old used SEP European style walking tractor (pic on right) to be our roto-tiller. The tiller is about 36" wide and is drive-shaft driven, so tilling with it bears no resemblance to tilling with all the other roto-tillers I've had to use through the years. At long last I'm not being yanked around by a loud bronco tearing around my garden trying to buck me off! I can guide this one with one hand. Good luck finding one used, though. And if you're wondering, I don't think they're worth buying new just for roto-tilling. But if you're interested, Earth Tools out of Owenton, Kentucky has been very helpful and no one in the US knows more about European style two-wheel tractors.

1993 Toyota Extended Cab Pickup (4X4): son Taylor is the world's most insane Tacoma fanman, so he found this thing for sale and told us to buy it. Best buy in the world. Doug and I also share the ownership of the pickup. It was cheap to buy and it costs very little in upkeep and repairs. Year after year, it just keeps purring and purring. When the moon is full, I go out and sing it songs of love and desire—all the songs Taylor taught me.

Tags:

Helpful things

Beauty

Loving the Church...

Benjamin Sulser — Mon, 10 Jul 2017 15:15:57 +0000

A friend of mine was commenting recently on my love for the church. It put me in mind of when and where I learned that love.

It was twelve years ago at the church Rob Rayburn serves in Tacoma, Washington. After a year or two attending Faith Presbyterian, I’d begun to be drawn into the life of the community. In my private devotions, I’d been meditating on Paul’s words in Ephesians 1:18 and they were striking home. That’s where Paul prays that the Ephesians will know "what are the riches of the glory of [God’s] inheritance in the saints.” The saints are full of riches. This is the Church.

For me, these riches were no abstraction. They were the riches of patience, kindness, long-suffering, love, and on and on; riches in the people I took for granted each week. God had put those riches in them through His Spirit.

I had never had much respect for the men and women who made up the churches I'd been in, but now it became clear...

how highly God prized them and I started wanting to prize them too. So I began to pray about it.

One Sunday I was walking toward the communion table with brothers and sisters walking behind and ahead of me—the usual. Some, coming back from the table toward their seats, smiled at me or put a hand on my shoulder as they went by. Again, the usual. But then for a few moments I had the sensation that the people around me were carrying me along.

It was true. They were carrying me and they had been for years. Not only them, but all of the brothers and sisters I had taken for granted. We were one body, the body of Christ.

As for the saints who are in the earth, They are the majestic ones in whom is all my delight. (Psalm 16:3)

Tags:

Gratitude

Love

Lord's Supper

Apple Park: $1 billion gets you no child care, but they'll freeze your kiddos...

Tim Bayly — Fri, 07 Jul 2017 19:01:35 +0000

This is Apple. After spending $1,000,000,000 on their new headquarters, we find out the campus has no place for children. No nurseries. No childcare. Keep the kids outta here. Keep the kids in the freezer. Keep the women unpregnant. Keep marriage beds sterile.

One Apple Park has no nurseries but they're happy to provide freezers where you can keep children you think you may want to let into this world at some point in the future. They provide freezing services for those kids-in-limbo (they try to lessen the scandal by referring to them as "embryos").

Concerning Apple's desire to freeze employees' children, Ad Age comments:

Let's engineer a way to keep those messy, demanding future humans in suspension.

No one would blame you for wondering if Apple's CEO is gay.

Tags:

Apple

Abortion, euthanasia

Bioethics

Throw the radio in the bathtub

Homosexual orientation: just in time, Gospel Coalition and Al Mohler arrive at wrong...

Tim Bayly — Fri, 07 Jul 2017 15:15:56 +0000

If you love those who identify as gays and lesbians and you want to learn to see through their eyes and lies, other than Scripture, there's no better source.

I'm referring to the survey of the literature titled, "Sexuality and Gender: Findings from the Biological, Psychological, and Social Sciences." I've been intending to post on it for quite a while now.

The survey was authored by Lawrence S. Mayer and Paul R. McHugh, and with or without an education, you can understand the things in this report that are important for our work with those suffering LGBTQ temptations.

The authors are eminently qualified. Mayer is a scholar in residence and McHugh is a prof of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. For twenty-five years, McHugh also served as psychiatrist-in-chief at Johns Hopkins Hospital.

A couple years ago, Al Mohler came out on the national stage saying he now no longer believed in reparative/gender identity counseling. He also "repented" of his former denial of homosexual orientation, stating that he now believes homosexual orientation is a real deal. Mohler goes on to...

say:

Put simply, most people experiencing a same-sex attraction tell of discovering it within themselves at a very early age, certainly within early puberty. As they experience it, a sexual attraction or interest simply “happens,” and they come to know it. The concept of sexual orientation is not only helpful, it is in some sense essential. ...There is a pattern of sexual interest and attraction that is discovered in early adolescence. It is not something that is, in itself, freely chosen.

Mohler's reversal on gender identity counseling and homosexual orientation run directly contrary to the research:

The most commonly accepted view in popular discourse we mentioned above — the “born that way” notion that homosexuality and heterosexuality are biologically innate or the product of very early developmental factors — has led many non-specialists to think that homosexuality or heterosexuality is in any given person unchangeable and determined entirely apart from choices, behaviors, life experiences, and social contexts. However, as the following discussion of the relevant scientific literature shows, this is not a view that is well-supported by research.

Speaking of a survey that "found that 35% of self-identified gay men reported experiencing opposite-sex attractions in the past year, and 10% of self-identified gay men reported opposite-sex sexual behavior during the same period," Mayer and McHugh write of "dispensing with the construct of sexual orientation in the context of social science research, as it seems that whatever it might represent, it is only loosely or inconsistently tied to empirically measurable phenomena."

Then this extended excerpt demonstrating how out of touch the LivingOut.org and Gospel Coalition men are in their understanding of sexuality, gender, and gender dysphoria:

Given the possibility of changes in sexual desire and attraction, which research suggests is not uncommon, any attempt to infer a stable, innate, and fixed identity from a complex and often shifting mélange of inner fantasies, desires, and attractions — sexual, romantic, aesthetic, or otherwise — is fraught with difficulties. We can imagine, for example, a sixteen-year-old boy who becomes infatuated with a young man in his twenties, developing fantasies centered around the other’s body and build, or perhaps on some of his character traits or strengths. Perhaps one night at a party the two engage in physical intimacy, catalyzed by alcohol and by the general mood of the party. This young man then begins an anguished process of introspection and self-exploration aimed at finding the answer to the enigmatic question, “Does this mean I’m gay?” Current research from the biological, psychological, and social sciences suggests that this question, at least as it is framed, makes little sense. As far as science can tell us, there is nothing “there” for this young man to discover — no fact of nature to uncover or to find buried within himself.

Get the document and read it. You will be inoculated against the ideological tripe being spread across the church today by famous Reformed men making their peace with the post-Obergefell world.

Yes, along with the other usual suspects, Huffington Post is trying to shout down Mayer and McHugh's report. What did you expect? Every unrepentant gay and lesbian wants the status of having been "born that way." It makes God the Author of their sin. Don't let them discourage you from taking the time to read this report. You will grow in your love and compassion for those tempted by sexual perversions.

Tags:

Homosexuality

Reformed world

Redeemer's effeminate worship...

Tim Bayly — Thu, 06 Jul 2017 02:35:19 +0000

Tim Keller's Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City had this for an offertory a couple months ago. My brother David once made the observation that "all the applause at classical concerts is self-congratulatory." Listen to the end of the video.

I just did a post on the gays in the Vatican. Added this post a few minutes later.

My greatest grief is not that Redeemer parades its cultural sophistication during Lord's Day services and the people applaud it. That's what you'd expect Tim Keller to produce in...

the souls he shepherds.

My real grief is that the unapologetically masculine bassoon was forced to lend support to this effeminacy. It should have gone on strike.

Hear tell lots of guys in Deformed Pub think this offertory is simply smashing.

Thanks Michael—I guess...

Tags:

Tim Keller

Throw the radio in the bathtub

Worship

In Vatican City, Pope keeps sodomy legal...

Tim Bayly — Thu, 06 Jul 2017 02:02:22 +0000

Italian newspaper il Fatto Quotidiano just disclosed another sodomite scandal in Vatican City.

A priest serving as personal secretary to one of the highest ranking cardinals in Rome's Curia was busted for drugs after Vatican Gendarmerie responded to complaints about a party. Entering the Monsignor's apartment, gendarmerie found it filled with drug-addled sodomites getting it on with one another. Vatican Gendarmerie had to take the monsignor to a hospital for detox before they could...

lock him up in the Vatican jail.

This Monsignor's apartment is owned by the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the agency responsible for cleaning up Rome's sodomitic clergy abuse scandal.

The cardinal this monsignor worked for had been trying to get Pope Francis to promote the monsignor to the episcopate.

il Fatto Quotidiano suggests the monsignor was able to get his drugs past Italian police and into Vatican City because his ride was a luxury car with plates from the Holy See.

The New York Post reports Vatican Gendarmerie arrested the monsignor for drugs, but not sodomy, because as they so delicately put it, "gay sex isn't illegal in Vatican City."

The monsignor has been sent away on retreat.

Not to a monastery, but a convent.

The Pope is contemplating bringing the hammer down on the monsignor.

No, that doesn't mean Pope Francis might fire the man. He'll just move him into retirement.

This is the Roman Catholic Church.

Tags:

Homosexuality

Roman Catholicism

Daddy Tried audiobook now available...

Jake Mentzel — Wed, 05 Jul 2017 18:35:28 +0000

Warhorn Media is pleased to announce that Tim Bayly's Daddy Tried is now available as an audiobook. If you haven't had a chance to read it for yourself, swing over to Audible.com or Amazon.com, download a copy, and have Tim read it for you.

We're also pleased to offer a free download of the Chapter 1 audio to Baylyblog readers.

Tags:

While Jews are persecuted, Evangelicals are captivated...

Tim Bayly — Wed, 05 Jul 2017 16:28:12 +0000

What goes down while UK Evangelicals are up in Keswick being "captivated" by OM's Peter Maiden, Alistair Begg, and "Research Professor" Don Carson?

London's private Vishnitz Orthodox girls' school fails its third inspection for conformity to the UK's Equalities Act and is on the verge of being shut down. Their crime?

The young Jewish women were not indoctrinated in “sexual orientation." Government inspectors declared "this restricts pupils’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural development and does not promote equality of opportunity in ways that take account of differing lifestyles."

What happens when UK pastors farm out their Biblical witness against the homosexualist juggernaut to the SSA chatterboxes of...

LivingOut.org?

The Independent reports that, last week, Ofsted (Office for Standards in Education) chief Amanda Spielman gave a speech "on the importance of teaching 'fundamental British values' within schools," adding that private schools which don't teach the homosexualist agenda must change or face closure.

Here's one of my favorite Good Shepherd Band songs. If you have any influence with the Keswick people, get them to invite these guys to get up and lead the music after Maiden, Begg, and Carson sit down.

You say you don't see the connection between Vishnitz and Keswick?

You're right; there is none. And that, my dear brother and sister, is the point.

There's also no connection between Vishnitz and LivingOut.org, and that too is the point.

Tags:

Homosexuality

Persecution

Evangelicalism

The book is finished: check it out on CrossPolitic...

Tim Bayly — Mon, 03 Jul 2017 20:37:42 +0000

Just now (and by "now," I mean now) I finished writing The Grace of Shame. Tentatively subtitled, 7 Errors that Keep the Church from Loving Homosexuals (And What To Do About Them), the book is co-authored by son Joseph and Jurgen von Hagen. All three of us are pastors, but here's a hint: one of the three is not like the others.

Get a feel for it by going over to CrossPolitic and listening to today's podcast.

The three guys behind CrossPolitic, David Shannon, Gabriel Rench, and Toby Sumpter, were great to work with and you'll want to sign up to support their work. Tell them I sent you.

Then look for Grace of Shame's release in a few months after it's turned down by all the publishers and we rob the piggy bank to get it printed and released.

If you want to help with that, please give me a shout.

Tags:

Homosexuality

Books

Helpful things

Rooting for President Trump...

Tim Bayly — Sun, 02 Jul 2017 19:58:22 +0000

Dad was from New York City. Until his sister came to live and die with us in 2001, her abode was the same Flushing apartment Dad found and moved his parents and sister into back in 1940 while he was a student at Wheaton College. Hear tell the building's owners had a blowout party to celebrate Aunt Elaine's departure after sixty years of rent control on her corner apartment.

So I've always known and kept track of The Donald, and for decades the souls I serve as pastor have observed my—shall I say it publicly?—loathing for him. My disgust with the man long predates his entry into politics. But if anything, The Donald's election as president has modulated my loathing. Yes, it continues; but now it's mixed with a certain grudging appreciation (as well as respect for the office of President)...

Take the current spat with the talking heads of CNN's Morning Joe. Yesterday, Mary Lee and I were talking and agreed that the lowest point of President Trump's bombast is when he speaks of women's blood. It's utterly repulsive, although I doubt I could explain this to the President, New York street fighter that he is. If the President granted me one wish, it wouldn't be that he finally prosecutes Bill's wife, but that he never speak of any woman's blood again. Seriously.

On the other hand, I find President Trump the perfect antidote to the media's conniving liars who, with the greatest sanctimony, call themselves the Fourth Estate and assure their inferiors who are merely citizens that their work writing hypocritical lies is the final and only hope for democracy's survival.

No, I am not at ALL chagrined at President Trump's scornful mockery of them, superimposing CNN on the head of a professional wrestler he is jumping up and down on, and whupping.

Pitch-perfect. Keep it up, President Trump—keep it up!

Maybe finally the plain vanilla and risk-averse midwesterners who have mounted the richest pulpits in Manhattan, Atlanta, Nashville, and St. Louis will recognize there is something even more important than space at the top of the Gray Lady's bestseller list.

Wouldn't that be something—if the PCA finally replaced it's effeminate preachers with real men who know that when the French say there are three sexes—men and women and clergymen—clergymen are not being complimented?

Mr. President, if you promise never to mention blood again, you have my full support for mocking and ripping the media to shreds. They are nothing but wicked liars—every last one of them—and since PCA pastors in New York City can't find it within themselves to oppose them, I'm giggling with excitement watching you do what they ought to have done long ago.

Doing what the Apostle Paul and John Calvin and John Knox and Martin Luther would have done with both hands tied behind their backs and their eyes closed.

Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; Who substitute darkness for light and light for darkness; Who substitute bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter! (Isaiah 5:20)

Tags:

Pusillanimous: Chancellor Merkel and Gospel Coalition...

Tim Bayly — Fri, 30 Jun 2017 15:14:05 +0000

Reading Sobran's article just posted reminded me of the word "pusillanimous."

Keep track of the words that have died. They tell us what we've become.

Public leadership in the church and uncivil society today is forevermore pusillanimous. The word had to be killed. If you're fighting under cover of darkness, you don't provide the enemy night vision goggles.

Pusillanimous is the perfect word to describe what Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel did earlier today. After showing her truest heart to a woman's magazine where she answered a question about sodomite marriage by emoting about a recent visit she'd had with a lesbian couple and their foster children, Merkel suggested the issue be put to a vote...

Immediately the question was called and, following one single hour of debate, Germany lowered itself into the cesspool of European nations who think it's a great idea for children to be raised without fathers or mothers.

Thing is, after emoting about the wonderful lesbians and paving the way for the uber-quick vote, the Chancellor Merkel herself voted against sodomite marriage.

Yup, you read that right: against.

This was Merkel pandering to her conservative base and it was as pusillanimous as pusillanimous can be.

There are only three words to resurrect if we determine ourselves to restore sanity to our world:

Pusillanimous.
Effeminate.
Equivocation.

Let me use all three words in one sentence, then provide an example.

The sentence:

Effeminate men are pusillanimous in their equivocations.

The example:

Gospel Coalition entices Ed Shaw to announce to their constituents that "Godliness is not heterosexuality."

Who can fault Germany's Chancellor Merkel when, here in the U.S., these are the Christian celebrities we follow?

Tags:

Homosexual unions

Homosexuality

Politics

Joe Sobran: Buzz Lightyear for president...

Tim Bayly — Fri, 30 Jun 2017 15:05:21 +0000

Another great article by Joe Sobran. I pity young men today who work in the pastorate and have to mature in their pastoral care and preaching without benefit of the weekly reading of Sobran I was blessed with in my mid-life.

Here's an excerpt to encourage you to click through and read the whole piece:

Utopian reflexes have become part of the job description of the American presidency. We take them for granted. The idea that the president is merely an "executive," that is, executing the laws passed by Congress, seems pathetic and pusillanimous. Today the president is supposed to think big, like Buzz Lightyear: "To infinity - and beyond!"

Not so long ago, the writer Henry Allen has observed, politics was a rather narrow specialty: fat guys in three-piece suits cutting deals in those famous smoke-filled rooms. Politics pretty much left you alone. Now it encompasses absolutely everything: the food you eat, the air you breathe, the clothes you wear. Nothing is off-limits. Politics is life!

Tags:

Politics