Calculus and Christ, The story of Sir Isaac Newton

Modern reader meet Isaac Newton the world's greatest mathematician. This is a delightful page turner that was so fun and so engaging to read. I literally enjoyed every paragraph. So many things you either forget or were never told about Newton. The author lines out the facts, the man, his fellows and enemies into a wonderful story that flows well. I am so thankful for being given the chance to read this book as it may be my favorite read for the whole year. Every 7th to 9th grader should be required to read this book so they can better engage their studies and their world. Its an absolute must for homeschooling families and Christian schools. This time you take to read this very approachable book will only enhance learning in every field.
What is it about a man, his life and his life's work that so engages us after almost 300 years since he died? Impact. Isaac Newton left an impact that affects every last educated person ever since his first works became famous in the late 1600s. Think about that. Every educated person on the planet since around 1680 has been touched by this man, used his equations in math, stayed up late trying to understand calculus, talked about and thought about gravity, planetary motion and optics. Newton's gravity apple never dropped on his head but the impact of the event has been placed inside the heads of millions. Thank you Mitch Stokes for cracking open the vault of history and reintroducing a man that we should have never forgotten in the first place. And, to my utter delight, I learned that Newton above all else loved the Lord Jesus and did everything, even math, for His glory. Can't wait to meet him in heaven. Sadly, the liberal, godless government schools since the 60s have stopped telling us the truth about the men of history that we study. How dare they not tell us that the most important thing to this man was not calculus but Christ.

I read this book as a free gift from www.booksneeze.com but they in no way tell the blogger what to write only that they have to write a review if they want to choose another book. Its a sweet deal and I am thankful.

Oh, now I understand Jane Austen

A book of biographical import concerning Jane Austen

Thanks to modern renditions in film and on stage, Jane Austen has a bigger following than ever before. I would imagine that an easily accessible biography would be helpful to those faithful followers. This book accomplishes that need and more. First, it is an easy read making it profitable in the home school setting to the university English department. Second, it is filled with all the sites and sounds of the Victorian age where 'Jenny' romped in life and story. I found it helpful to get to know the author of some of my favorite movies in the family DVD collection. Pride and Prejudice has been burned into the pixels of our television and so knowing the person behind P&P, as we call it, was enjoyable.
Concerning this book, I found it to be boorish and dry at times but a few extant comments or quotes from Jane herself kept me plowing ahead to the end. The author did a more than fair job in revealing the world behind the woman behind the writings. The author has done a more than adequate job in tying the life with the writings on Jane. The reader will be particularly impressed with the skill of the author painting a picture of Jane from all the available resources. I will remember her overall dealings with friends and family, her short 41 years and the events surrounding her death in 1817. Place this volume next to the novels and the DVDs to reference often. My complimentary copy from Booksneeze will be gifted down the line to the next P&P lover in the family.

Knuckle dragging theology

The Selfless Gene
Knuckle dragging theology
By Charles Foster

The author and I have at least one thing in common: anger. He wrote that he was 'angry while writing the book' and I was angry while reading it. In the Selfless Gene, Foster attempts to so disparage and belittle Christians who actually believe the Bible concerning the creation account in hopes of shattering faith thus allowing his gods, natural selection plus whatever force allowed altruism, joy, pain and pleasure, to be seated. The hated view point of the 'Young Earth Creationists', as he calls them, so irritates this man that he feels compelled to shower the reader with gifts of evidence from science and logic. If anything, I am grateful to the author for hopefully showing the Answers In Genesis crowd that trying to dispute or prove various artifacts of evidence will never win or charm anyone into accepting God as sovereign over His creation. No matter which evidential rabbit trail you wonder down with an evolutionist you will always be tempted to point out folly concerning this bone or that rock in their thinking. The answers from the Creationists will always be the same: "God did it!" And, the answers from the evolutionists will always be the same too: "natural selection did it!" Dead ends, deaf ears and no common ground whatsoever will be found. The author tries and the author fails to find middle ground with a very poor conclusion to the book which leaves the reader with nothing: nothing to believe and nothing to hold. Be warned Christian reader, this man is certainly a wolf in predatory, natural selection, eat or be eaten clothing with no semblance of costuming. He openly states that Creationist evidence and positions are foolish and that after reading his book he will enlighten you and win you out of darkness. As usual, the evolutionist fails to answer the question, the most important question in the universe, why? Why us, why earth, why anything as opposed to nothing? Only God can answer that question and the evolutionist denies God so therefore these questions simply remained unanswered and really unasked by them. I have news for the author, evolutionists and evidential Creationists alike, the answer to our universe is very simple: God created an 'old earth' with the appearance of age. This theory is called the Appearance of Age Theory. The author apparently has never heard of it nor has it ever crossed his mind either. Here it is in a nutshell: God created the earth with the appearance of age for that is the only way He could have done it. Let me illustrate: Five minutes after God created an Oak tree if Adam were to chop it down how many growth rings would it have? By simple definition a certain aged tree must have growth rings equal to the seasonal yearly changes of growth. God created it and so created a 100 year old tree that was actually only five minutes 'old'. The same holds true with humans, rocks, gamma radiation, light rays and every other created thing. They all look and have to be a certain age to even exist and yet they were only minutes old after God spoke them into being. Why not reader? Couldn't God, who we believe to be all powerful and sovereign, create the world however He wished? This is exactly what I believe and it perfectly explains the world and every artifact. However, its not even close to being the most foolish thing I believe. No, I believe in something even more far-fetched. I believe that an ancient Jewish carpenter's son's death on a cross actually provided everything I needed to have all my sins forgiven and be put in perfectly right standing before God, my Creator. Now that's foolishness. I guess the author and those who buy in to his illogical conclusions will continue to drag their knuckles into the naturally selected godless, Christless future. As for me, I will continue to serve and believe God who supernaturally revealed Himself to me by His Word, the Bible by the enlightening of my darkened mind by God, Holy Spirit. Make no mistake about this book. This book is a battle but not the battle the author tries to fight between creationists and evolutionists. No, this battle is even more important concerning the trustworthiness of God's written word, the Bible, and the clear message of the gospel contained in that perfect Word. If the author doesn't want to believe what the bible says about creation why would he believe what the Bible says about Christ? The Bible, God and the gospel are on trial in this book.

Eternity is in your heart too!

Don Richardson has added a nice addition to the field of missiology. He has put in tremendous effort in gathering, researching and compiling information on his theory of 'redemptive analogies'. These analogies are the usable, one true God proof footprints within nearly every culture and tribe found on the planet. His chapter, 'Scholars with strange theories' is well worth the price of book and is Richardson at his scholastic finest. He clearly shows that Darwinian evolutionists have the growth of world religions completely wrong debunking the view that polytheism and animism evolved first then led to monotheism later. Turns out that the evidence from the field proves just the opposite that belief in monotheism was first and early then later became distorted through time and distance by isolated tribes.
A couple of areas that I believe Richardson misses on has to do in the areas of monotheist origins and sovereignty of God over missions, man's salvation and even man's knowledge of the one true God. His created words and concepts such as the Melchizedek factor for monotheist imprints from general revelation are not helpful to his argument and somewhat make his viewpoint sound 'cheesy'. He never explores the scattering of people groups that would have carried knowledge of the one true God from the tower of Babel episode in Genesis and the amazing trade routes and far expansive empire set up by the kings of Israel, especially Solomon. Tribes on remote islands had to get there somehow and most probably by sailing ships or ocean going boats and therefore would have come from established populations all stemming from God's original pair: Adam and Eve. Instead he invents an answer that God mysteriously has this general revelation of a messiah that he has implanted into mankind. I believe the bible supports specific revelation that God spoke and thus revealed details about Himself. He gives too much credit to general revelation. Finally, he never seems to credit God as sovereign over the entire salvation process from missionary endeavor, man's response and man's lack of a true free will. He goes into a biblically unsupported rant on page 173 that God is not able to penetrate man's freewill but only through man's logical persuasion through the missionary’s well crafted and well timed message. This is pure biblical nonsense and totally unsupported in the bible.
Other than these two key areas I still highly regard this work and all of Richardson's works for their excellent information
and writing.

in reference to: Product: Eternity in Their Hearts (view on Google Sidewiki)

Rugby takes off in Brentwood TN

I have three kids in the program and it is terrific. Rugby, I hope will take over soccer and even football. All body types and abilities can play and everyone gets to touch the ball! Way better than other sports.

in reference to: Brentwood Life :: Local Sports : Rugby Gains Momentum on Middle School Level (view on Google Sidewiki)

My bible reading plan for 2010. Do you have a plan?

One Year Bible OnLine - http://shar.es/aU1Ve

The most unlikely Christians: head-hunting cannibals.

"Thank you" shouted a thousand times from a thousand Sago thatched rooftops would not be enough to recommend this book to you. Having worked for Gospel Light for over a decade made me certainly familiar with this book that was first published in the 70s but for whatever reason I never got around to reading it. What was I thinking? I loved this book from cover to cover and did not want it to end. Don Richardson is a terrific story teller and writer. The story flows and is very compelling as I learned all about the conversion of the Sawi cannibal tribe of Irian Jaya. His discovery, explanation and illustration of God's thumbprint of a redemptive analogy in this culture will blow you away. I left this book with my mouth wide opened as I search my shelves for the other books Richardson has written. I have read thousands of books and this one is firmly in my top ten! Read this book. Live this book by finding the redemptive analogies in your own culture that God may use for His glory.