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It's appropriate that we have David on the show this week. You may remember that he sported a stars-and-stripes headband in his heyday in support of our troops during the first Gulf War ... though we really don't talk about that on the show.

But we do celebrate the 232nd anniversary of declaring our independence from the Kingdom of Great Britain with patriotic music from the Colorado Wranglers and a partial reading of the Declaration of Independence.

Now back to David Wheaton.

Roundtable -- 10:01
David Wheaton was such a gracious guest. He indulged some very personal questions about being a 39 year-old single. And he openly acknowledges how his career as a highly ranked tennis pro put him on a trajectory that made it difficult to meet godly, eligible young women. But he leaves little doubt that despite his desire for marriage and family, he feels he's in the center of God's will.

Culture -- 25:29
Though David Wheaton still plays professionally, he's transitioned well from tennis pro to author, speaker, and radio talk show host. After the Roundtable, he and Lisa talk about his book University of Destruction in light of the recent Pew Research study chronicling the large percentage of evangelicals who believe there are many paths to Heaven. 

Hungry Years -- 45:25
This week we celebrate the 4th of July with a partial reading of the Declaration of Independence expertly voiced by our very own Dave Salkeld, engineer for The Boundless Show. So, as Lisa encourages, grab a slice of apple pie, sit back and relive this bit of history with us.

Inbox -- 49:49
Do Christian men experience more pressure to marry than non-Christians? Hear from a listener who is growing increasingly weary of being around happily married Christians while longing for a wife himself. Steve, Candice, Lisa and I offer our perspectives including, get those happily married Christians to help you out!

Can God Use a Flawed Book to Bring Glory to Himself? If God uses flawed humans to accomplish His will, it's a pretty safe bet to say He can do the same with a flawed book. In fact, shortly after becoming a Christian, I read a book that I found helpful at the time that I would never recommend to a new believer today. God used it despite its flaws, but I would never deliberately introduce those flaws to someone else now that I know better.

Does Our Theology Have to Be Perfect Before God Will Save Us? Of course not. In fact, no one's theology is anywhere near perfect when God saves him, since Scripture makes clear that an unbelieving world cannot see the truth until God reveals it to him. Your knowledge of chemistry doesn't have to be perfect before beginning a chemistry class, either, but woe to the knowledgeable teacher who knowingly allows bad chemistry to be taught to novices. Why do we think it's any different when it comes to matters of God?

Do We Have to Insist on Perfect Theology When Trying to Reach Unbelievers? Again, of course not. In fact, I am friends with a young man who, depending on the day or week, confesses Christ as Lord and Savior one minute and then posits all sorts of New Agey hokum the next. The best thing I can do is answer his questions as best as possible, correct him lovingly (and choosing very carefully which battles I even want to fight), but most important, remain his friend.

When talking to someone who is asking sincere questions, I am not going to throw the five points of Calvinism at him. I am not going to recite the Nicene Creed or a 10-part acrostic sermon on the Gospel of John. But if he insists on something that is incorrect, I will correct him. I will point to Scripture or, if necessary, the wisdom of teachers before me, to guide him into truth as best I can.

Significantly, no one actually used theological arguments to object to what I've written. Some were emotional responses, some speculative, some snarky, but many were along the lines that I should just lighten up.

I will not gainsay anyone's experience of reading this book. In fact, I encourage mature, discerning believers to read it so they know what it says. But in evaluating The Shack I will always do so in light of what God has already chosen to reveal about himself to us: the Bible. In that light, The Shack is severely deficient.

In short, if a starving person comes to you for food, will you give him a stone, or will you give him bread? If a malnourished person comes to you, will you give him a Twinkie, or good nutritious food?

So it wasn't a surprise for me to notice, during a particularly windy week this past Spring (we're talking continual 40 mph all day), that the American flag flying in the school parking lot was tattering. It made me cringe a little, but I gave a little sigh of relief the next morning when I saw a brand new flag flying. The following morning, the American flag was toast again (I'm not exaggerating about the winds -- they were brutal). And then, that afternoon, a new flag was in its place.

Call me obsessive-compulsive. Maybe nobody else noticed that the flag was torn and replaced, and torn and replaced again. But I did. And I know why -- I was taught to. Back in the good old, sixth-grade, "junior police" days, my duties were to get the little kids across the crosswalk, guard the bikes and take care of the school flag. I can still remember my "flag duty" days, hoping against hope that it would rain and I would get to race outside, bring the flag down and fold it in the proper way we were taught. Any excuse to get out of class, you know?

The flag's care was emphasized to us so much that, even today, I still want to stop and pull a flag down if I see it flying in the rain (although, I have since learned that an all-weather flag can continue to fly in the rain).

An article in this morning's paper reminded me of a few other points of flag etiquette:

• Fly the flag only during the day, unless it is illuminated.
• The flag should be raised briskly and lowered slowly and ceremoniously (um, yeah, didn't always follow this as a sixth-grader getting soaked in the rain).
• The flag should never be stepped on, have anything placed on it or be draped over any type of vehicle.
• The flag is not for sword fighting (this isn't actually in the US Flag Code, but I am teaching it to my four-year-old son).

So, Happy Fourth of July, all. Fly those flags proudly!

And, speaking of etiquette and honoring things, did anybody else's parents teach them never to place anything on top of the Bible? Just wondering. 

I couldn't agree more. In fact that's the very argument I was just making Tuesday night with a friend who is leaning toward the presidential candidate I'm working against.

Funny thing is, I rarely, if ever, agree with the New York Times, where that quote appeared.

But alas, that's where my agreement ends. Where I praise the Supreme Court's 5-4 decisions to uphold the Second Amendment rights of citizens to keep and bear arms, to allow states to require voters to present some proof of who they are before voting, and to allow violent criminals convicted of the death penalty to be put to death by lethal injection, the Times chides it.

Where I bemoan the Court's 5-4 decisions to award the rights of U.S. citizens to enemy combatants and to deny the death penalty as an allowable punishment for those monsters convicted of raping a child, they praise them as "undeniable good news."

Alas, both ends of the political spectrum know that who occupies the White House starting in 2009 will most-assuredly have much influence over which way the court leans.

The NYT worries that "One more conservative appointment would shift the balance to the far-right bloc." Conversely, millions of conservatives worry that another liberal appointment would do the same in the other direction, shifting the court to the far-left bloc.

The stakes, indeed, are high.

According to Oprah's website, Thomas has the media buzzing, people talking and is making headlines around the world. Not surprising, considering there hasn't been a pregnant man since, well, creation.

But there's a catch, of course. Thomas is not a man.

Thomas was born Tracy. In 2002, Tracy opted to have her breasts surgically removed, her chest reconstructed and began testosterone therapy. Then Tracy moved to have her gender legally changed to male and became Thomas -- all the while keeping her female reproductive organs.

After marrying, Thomas and wife Nancy decided to have children. "Wanting to have a child is neither a male or female desire," Thomas wrote, "but a human desire." It may be a human desire, but it still takes a female body to carry a child. So Thomas stopped the testosterone, returned to a female ovulation cycle and conceived via sperm donation. The baby -- a daughter -- is to be delivered by cesarean section today.

Thomas seems to believe that a pregnancy changes nothing. "I am transgender, legally male and legally married to Nancy," she wrote. "Despite the fact that my belly is growing with a new life inside me, I am stable and confident being the man I am."

Stable and confident, Thomas may be. She may even be "legally male." But the plain, and tragic, truth is that Thomas is not a man. She is a woman who has done many, many things to try to look like a man, but who is still a woman down to every piece of DNA. A "bearded lady," but a lady just the same.

Oprah stated that Thomas' situation brings a "new definition of what diversity means for everybody." But not really. God designed women to bear children -- as they have since Eve -- and Thomas hasn't changed that.

Yesterday, Newsweek posted a True or False article titled "Having Kids Makes You Happy."

Here's their answer:

The most recent comprehensive study on the emotional state of those with kids shows us that the term "bundle of joy" may not be the most accurate way to describe our offspring. "Parents experience lower levels of emotional well-being, less frequent positive emotions and more frequent negative emotions than their childless peers," says Florida State University's Robin Simon, a sociology professor who's conducted several recent parenting studies, the most thorough of which came out in 2005 and looked at data gathered from 13,000 Americans by the National Survey of Families and Households. "In fact, no group of parents—married, single, step or even empty nest—reported significantly greater emotional well-being than people who never had children. It's such a counterintuitive finding because we have these cultural beliefs that children are the key to happiness and a healthy life, and they're not."

The articles states that the researcher received a lot of hate mail after her findings were published. But I'm unaffected. In fact, I would be more shocked if the opposite were true. I mean, really, am I to expect anything different from a country where one of the "happiest" days of the year for parents is the first day of school? Our culture practically encourages the devaluation of the company of children with all the ways you can outsource the hard work: daycare, preschool, K-12, youth groups, sports camps, television, etc.

It seems that all these happiness studies do is reflect how selfish we are. And there's nothing in the world that'll expose our desire for self more than kids.

Raising children is hard, expensive, and life-long. It's practically non-stop work for about 20 or 30 years (depending on how many you have). So if you primarily see them as mouths to feed, carpet stains and college tuition, then the research makes perfect sense. For these kinds of parents, happiness fades as soon as their narcissistic expectations begin to go unmet.

But thankfully, that's not the way God feels about children. God says that children are a gift; that the family with many is blessed. And Jesus made a statement about the value of children when He rebuked his disciples for preventing them from coming to him. So who need "happiness" surveys when you have God's promises to rely on.

I have very high hopes for reading four books this summer. Among them is Why We're Not Emergent (By Two Guys Who Should Be) by Kevin DeYoung and Ted Kluck. DeYoung is a pastor, Kluck a sportswriter. Together they analyze the emergent movement and explain why they're not on board. In Divergent from Emergent, BreakPoint's Travis K. McSherley reviews the book. DeYoung and Kluck's critique of the movement is "needed" he says:

The emergent church rejects many of the methodologies and rigid proclamations of traditional, conservative Christianity, which it accuses of being unloving or arrogant. No doubt, some of those shoes fit all too well. But the emergent response has been to go to war (not literally, of course) against preaching, theology, certainty, exclusiveness, and perhaps even orthodoxy itself—the philosophical backbone of the faith.

The book is a mixture of doctrinal analysis by DeYoung and human interest bits by Kluck. McSherley explains why the format works:

Although placing DeYoung's more theological arguments side by side with Kluck's stories makes for a bit of an unorthodox (so to speak) read, the presentation works quite well. And it demonstrates nicely what may be the central idea of the book: that the emergent movement is right in what it draws attention to but wrong in what it throws away.

In fact, as Tim Challies notes:

Ultimately the authors conclude, as have many Christians, that "Emergent Christians need to catch Jesus' broader vision for the church—His vision for a church that is intolerant of error, maintains moral boundaries, promotes doctrinal integrity, stands strong in times of trial, remains vibrant in times of prosperity, believes in certain judgment and certain reward, even as it engages the culture, reaches out, loves, and serves. We need a church that reflects the Master's vision—one that is deeply theological, deeply ethical, deeply compassionate, and deeply doxological."

If you want to learn more about the emergent movement, this user-friendly book may be a good place to start. (Tom also offers some helpful thoughts here.) McSherley concludes:

Why We're Not Emergent may not be the authoritative final word in the emergent discussion, but it is a well-written and helpful contribution from two writers who, as the subtitle suggests, "should be" carrying the emergent torch themselves. Instead, they have crafted a thoughtful rebuttal that not only offers plenty of reasons to question the emergent trend, but also encourages and challenges the Body of Christ to seek both truth and love.

Sounds like a worthy course of thought for me to entertain this summer.

HT: The Point

According to the Zimbabwe Independent, whose tagline is "The Leading Business Weekly," inflation is likely closer to 10.5 million percent now.

Paper money has become so meaningless in Zimbabwe, and the political situation so deplorable, that the company that provides the paper to print the bills, Munich-based Giesecke & Devrient, is no longer sending tons of the stuff to the Zimbabwean capital of Harare.

With no ability to pump out their Z500,000,000 bills, Mugabe's government will find it difficult to pay his thugs, and it's very possible that he's days or weeks away from losing control. That day can't come soon enough, in my opinion, though I don't think losing that one man will be enough to turn things around in the former "Breadbasket of Africa."

Please pray for the peace of Harare.

While fiction is by definition a story that doesn't pretend to be true, it still must adhere to certain basic rules. You can create any universe you like, but once you've created it, you must stick to its internal logic. If zurts are green and fly and jurts are blue and don't fly, you cannot willy-nilly switch these "facts" around, even if they are totally products of your imagination. And if for some reason in your story we see a blue jurt that is flying, you'd better have a good narrative explanation for why or else you've confused the reader.

A good example of this rule of fiction is seen in the Star Trek universe. Many a Star Trek staple such as the transporters violates the laws of physics. Credit the show's creators for knowing this and coming up with a work-around. My favorite example is the Heisenberg Compensators. According to the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, the transporters shouldn't work, since they could never disassemble and reassemble an object atom by atom. Hence the fictional compensators. When someone asked Star Trek technical advisor Michael Okuda how the compensators worked, he answered, "They work just fine, thank you." (For more such fun, I recommend The Physics of Star Trek.)

If you're going to ground your fiction in the real world, then it must conform to the rules of the real world we live in. No unicorns or magic squirrels allowed. Even one of my favorite literary genres, Magical Realism, adheres to certain basic rules.

So if you're going to have God as a character in your real-world fiction, then you must deal with God as he has revealed himself in Scripture. By using the Trinity as characters in this story set in the real world, The Shack author William P. Young is clearly indicating that he's supposedly talking about the God of Christianity. But God has said certain things about himself in Scripture, and much of what Young does in this novel contradicts that. I don't care if he's trying to make God more "accessible." He's violated the rules of fiction.

More important, why does Young feel the need to change the character of God in this story? In a way, he's saying that the God who reveals himself to us in the Bible is insufficient. Young needs to "improve" the image to make it more palatable. But as I said in the original post, God never changes himself so that we can understand Him better. He changes us so that we can see Him as he truly is. If God changed his nature, He would cease to be God.

If a friend had a cold, abusive father, don't make the God of your story into a warm, loving female to compensate. Show your friend what a true father is like, using the example from Scripture. If your friend is hurting, don't comfort him with soothing lies, such as The Shack's assertion that God does not judge sin. Show him the God of all comfort found in Scripture, the God who was willing to save you from that judgment by sending his Son.

To those people who have snapped up copies of The Shack to give to non-Christian friends, you are doing them no favors. You are introducing them to a false god. You are inoculating them against the claims of the True God of Scripture. And more to the point, you're just giving them bad fiction.