Great Piper Quote on the importance of Hebrew and Greek

"We may impress one another for a while by dropping the name of the latest book we've read, but secondhand food will not sustain and deepen our people's faith and holiness. Weakness in Greek and Hebrew also gives rise to exegetical imprecision and carelessness. And exegetical imprecision is the mother of liberal theology. Where pastors can no longer articulate and defend doctrine by a reasonable and careful appeal to the original meaning of Biblical texts, they will tend to become close-minded traditionalists who clutch their inherited ideas, or open-ended pluralists who don't put much stock in doctrinal formulations. In both cases the succeeding generations will be theologically impoverished and susceptible to error."

John Piper - "Brother, We Are Not Professionals."

more pics

Here we have Sassy with a crown on, my kids and my sister Jennifer's (and her husband Jim's) kids (James and Joel), Christmas morning at our house in Cincinnati, Maria with her great grandfather, Paul by the tree in front of our house, Abigail teaching Maria how to ride a bike, the kids playing at Sharon Woods indoor park, movie night (3-bedroom apartment style - we all just pyle on the bed and watch DVDs on the computer since we don't have a TV here (that's on purpose by the way, so I'll study more...), and finally: swimming in December!

We're back in Mississippi!

The Hebrew 1 final went well - whew! Thanks to everyone for praying. I also preached the morning and evening service this past Sunday - after driving back from Cincinnati Saturday. On Sunday night, I was as exhausted as I have ever been. Thankfully, Amy drove a large portion of the way on Saturday. I was able to study Hebrew and work on the two sermons in the car. That 718 miles feelts longer every time we drive it.

I will miss you all, but it is nice to see my friends at the Pearl Presbyterian Church here in Pearl, MS. One of families there, bless them, donated a washer and drying to our cause. Amy had been making trips to the laundromat about once every couple of weeks to wash just enough clothes for us to get by... but when you have kids my kids' ages, well, *lots* of clothes get *really* dirty *really* quickly.

Anyway - I'll try to update this poor blog more often. For those here in the south - it is great to be back! For those up in the north - we'll see you in May!

Here are the kids in their Christmas program at the Pearl church: