This is the Gospel

This post is part of the General Conference Odyssey. This is the 369th week, and we’re covering the Saturday afternoon session of the October 1999 General Conference.

The older I get, the less I feel that I know. But, as I grow more and more uncertain about a wide range of things–my assessment of people, my politics, even my tastes in movies and books, everything changes!–there are a few, isolated things that I grow more confident in, and that–in part because they are so few–seem more important with every passing year. 

Continue reading “This is the Gospel”

Earrings, Scrupulosity, and Love

This post is part of the General Conference Odyssey. This is the 368th week, and we’re covering the Saturday morning session of the October 1999 General Conference.

It’s been a long time since I started this General Conference Odyssey way back in 2015. I stuck with it really well through about 2019 and had another good chunk in 2020, but I missed pretty much all of 2021 and 2022. One of my goals is to stick with it again throughout 2023. Eventually I’ll go back and fill in all the gaps, but I don’t know when that will be.

Continue reading “Earrings, Scrupulosity, and Love”

Church Spending

Church finances are often a point of criticism. But should they be?

In thinking about church finances, it’s helpful to have a basic grasp of tools large organizations use to make complex decisions around investments and spending. In this presentation we look at one of those tools, the Analytic Hierarchy Process, and think about how organizations bring maturity to their decision making processes.

The important question to consider is, what methodologies are the church’s critics employing? And are those superior to frameworks like AHP?

Continue reading “Church Spending”

Presentation on Spiritual Discernment

How can we tell the difference between God’s influence and other things like emotion?

What are signs of good versus evil spiritual energy?

What are signs of demonic influence?

We discuss these and other questions in this presentation; slides here:

Continue reading “Presentation on Spiritual Discernment”