Random

~ Gary Walter is the nominee for president of the Evangelical Covenant Church. Excellent... excellent... excellent. That's Gary in the picture -- looking presidential -- even five years ago. -- Link

~ Bob Smietana has been interviewed by Terry Mattingly on the GetReligion blog. The blog focuses on religion coverage in the media. Bob recently left his job as an editor with the Covenant Companion to take a position as a religion reporter with the Tennessean in Nashville. -- Link

~ ...MySpace has agreed to add several protections and participate in a working group to develop new technologies, including a way to verify the ages of users. Other social networking sites will be invited to participate. -- Link

~ "All doubts about the identity of the Mona Lisa have been eliminated." I am soooo relieved. Now, if they can solve the Texas UFO mystery I'll be able to sleep at night.

~ When is your worship too loud? -- Link -- Amen.

~ Sociologist Bradley Wright has an insightful perspective on Willow Creek's great revelation of 2007 -- Link

~ Asia is replacing the West as the major influence on the Pacific islands. -- He (Ron Crocombe, professor emeritus at the University of the South Pacific) says while hundreds of books have discussed the European wave that swept through the region, "the wave from Asia will bring changes as radical as those wrought by Europeans over the past 200 plus years".

"He anticipates the European gene pool in the islands' populations will diminish as that from Asia rises." -- Must read story for anyone with Pacific connections

~ Bookmark: WorkingPreacher.org -- lectionary resources

~ It's been awhile since I mentioned the Abet list that I oversee. This is an email dialog list with perhaps an average of 2 or 3 daily posts, which is aimed at church leaders in Evangelical Covenant churches -- but there are others who have been in there, too. To subscribe go to the Abet Info page.

~ There are four emerging church models according to C. Wess Daniels -- Link (via) -- I think that there is a fifth category -- the old "please don't put any kind of label on me -- WE transcend all that nonsense" model -- which seems pretty popular.

~ Just the stats -- Martin Marty's latest *Sightings* on religious statistics is worth a look. How does that guy consistently pack so much into five paragraphs? -- Link