This past Saturday we went to downtown Lynchburg to the open air market that sells Virginia-grown vegetables, flowers, and other wonderful items. This market has such a flavor of Lynchburg. The sellers are friendly, welcoming and helpful. The buyers are polite, friendly, and respectful. It’s just a great time.

In addition to the outdoor sales, the market includes an indoor area where folks display various crafts and more food. The craftsmanship is amazing and tremendously varied. There are also small retail shops in this indoor area including restaurants.

Radishes at the market

We found this market when we first moved to Lynchburg about two years ago and determined that we needed to go back often. We have not done it often enough, but decided to go on Saturday.

We purchased eggs, a huge chunk of real churned butter, flavored goat cheese, quiche, Italian sausage, some brown eggs (that still had a hen feather on one of them), and other wonderful food items—all for way below store prices. We also purchased some flowers for decorating the front of our house.

Our son chose some beautiful daffodils, which will look great in front of our house planted in two small cement urns. He has always had great taste in decorating. And my wife chose a beautiful hanging plant with purple flowers, which is now hanging from a shepherd’s hook next to our front walk.

One of the patrons in the café

After leaving the market, we decided to just walk around Lynchburg and enjoy the city. We walked down to the waterfront where our son watched some long freight trains go by. We walked to Amazement Square—a great hands-on children’s museum. We walked to the large air conditioning units outside Amazement Square that have been converted into a full-sized school bus for the children to play in. The children can turn the front tires with the steering wheel, turn on the blinkers, honk the horn, turn on the windshield wipers, and open and close the cool bi-fold entrance doors. My son loves it.

We walked down a street we had not walked before and found a fantastic camera shop (which I’m sure will become a regular hangout for me). We walked past the delightful mix of eclectic architecture Lynchburg’s city buildings present.

Inklings Used Book Store

And we went to the fantastic Inklings Used Bookstore (and café). The coffee is amazingly wonderful. If this place takes off, Starbucks will be out of business. And the bookstore is delightful too. I found a copy of Berkhof’s Systematic Theology in great shapre for a great price. My wife found some wonderful treasures in books too. The owner of the store is an Episcopalian priest and is a very interesting man. I think you would have to be unusual in order to successfully run a store like this.

As always, it was a thoroughly enjoyable time out and about in our wonderful City. We love Lynchburg!

Did I mention, we love Lynchburg?

This week’s photo is another of the photos I adjusted in Photoshop for use in our church’s lyric projection for the praise songs. This barn is located on a hill to the side of Route 29 in Nelson County, Virginia. Everytime I passed this barn I was struck with its beauty, especially against the mountains in the background.

Finally, one day I drove to the side of the road, pulled out my camera and took this photograph. I took the photo in black & white but placed our church’s logo on the side of the barn in Photoshop.

© Richard D. Gelina

C.H. Spurgeon
The Golden Key of Prayer

As spring scatters flowers, so supplication ensures mercies.

© Richard D. Gelina

C.H. Spurgeon
The Practice of Praise

Praise means this, that you and I are appointed to tell forth the goodness of God. Just as the birds of spring wake up before the sun and begin singing—and all of them singing with all their might—so become the choristers of God. Praise the Lord evermore, even as they do who, with songs and choral symphonies. Day and night, circle His throne rejoicing. This is your holy and privileged office.

© Richard D. Gelina

Martin Luther

A man who could make one rose . . . would be accounted most wonderful; yet God scatters countless such flowers around us! His gifts are so infinite that we do not see them.

© Richard D. Gelina

If you are interested in the answers to these questions, you need to check out two outstanding web sites:

• Under Much Grace Blog
• Under Much Grace Web Site

Because so many earnest Christians still remain ignorant of the phenomenon of cultic social practices within Biblical Christianity, I hope to increase awareness and hopefully spare others the pain and tragedy that I have endured. Most Christians have no knowledge of the techniques of thought reform and psychologcial manipulation employed by legalistic Christian groups, so this site purposes to inform as many people as possible of the cultic nature of these otherwise Christian schools of thought.

Of special interest to me is the increased interest and acceptance of “Family Integrated Churches” which promotes the traditional idea of family as central to the restoration of Christianity within Western Civilization. I am deeply disturbed by this trend because groups such as Vision Forum headed by Doug Phillips promote the family but with rigid, legalistic standards of acceptable conduct. These extra-biblical standards are dangerous in my opinion but are marketed and widely accepted by many unknowing Christians as Biblically sound and orthodox. The tactics and practices used and promoted by Doug Phillips via the Vision Forum vehicle correspond to cultic practice and thus create a hegemonic and neo-Gnostic belief system. Because of the strong focus on their own version of Patriarchy, it is the opinion of many that the sequelae of this system present a very real danger to women.

William Wilberforce dedicated his life to improving the morals of English society and to the total and complete abolition of the slave trade. We can read his writings and look at the world around us and realize that his dreams have been fulfilled. We can celebrate the life of William Wilbeforce, rejoicing in the knowledge that what he worked so hard to accomplish has become a reality today.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

But what of Dr. Martin Luther King’s dream? We all know what his dream was—he stood on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in our nation’s capitol and told us what that dream was. Dr. King said that he had a dream that one day all men “will be judged not by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.” Has Dr. King’s dream become a reality?

In a day when the majority of people in our society proclaim that we are making personal attacks against anyone whose character we call into question, I think the answer must be “no.” In a day when a Barack Obama can run for the presidency of our nation and although he seldom speaks of race, we hear non-stop reports (both favorable and negative) about him being “the first black man to run for the presidency,” and we hear about folks even from Obama’s political party stating that he could never have made it this far had he been a white man, implying that he is succeeding only because of the color of his skin and not because of any excellence on his part.

These attitudes are not what Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., fought and died for. May we all commit ourselves to viewing and judging those around us not by the color of their skin or the nation of their origin, but by the content of their character. And I would add to that the need to judge them also by their understanding and belief in the death and resurrection of the Son of God who came to save people from every tribe, tongue, and nation—not because of the color of their skin, or because of the content of their character, but because of their great need of a Savior. I don’t recommend judging them to disenfranchise them, but to target them for the proclamation of the gospel because if they do not yet believe in Jesus Christ, this is their greatest need.

This passage from My Imitation of Christ by Thomas à Kempis admonishes us in these matters. I think it is good advice and worthy of consideration:

Nehemiah 12:43   And they offered great sacrifices that day and rejoiced, for God had made them rejoice with great joy; the women and children also rejoiced. And the joy of Jerusalem was heard far away.

I enjoy this verse so much. Even with our electronic sound reinforcement, our churches don’t typically praise God at a volume level that may be “heard far away.” Imagine how great this must have been.

I can’t wait to hear what it’s going to sound like in heaven!

Navigators: How God Looks Upon a Distorted Gospel deals with our need to stick to the Word of God, not adding or subtracting according to our own agenda or whim.

Navigators: People-Pleasing Preachers discusses directly the common current problem of adjusting the church’s message to suit the “itching ears” of the congregation. This post is particularly important during these days of “Seeker Sensitivity,” Bill Hybels, Rick Warren, and the other fad-driven church-growth people and programs.

Take a read, comment on the thoughts, join the discussion.