Honey Dearest is my new favorite food, cooking, and wine & spirits blog on the Internets, and not just because they are great friends. It’s just a great blog, period.

Shelley Lubben is an incredible, living testimony of God’s authentic love and miraculous grace. Shelley is a former stripper, prostitute, and porn actress who cried out to God in her time of most desperate need. She cried out! God answered her! Jesus saved her, healed her from an incurable STD, and empowered her to be a missionary to the sex industry. What an awesome testimony! Shelley also founded the Pink Cross Foundation, an outreach effort dedicated to porn performers and sex workers. God bless you Shelley Lubben!

Check this post of exceptional reflections on $4.00 gasoline by the best New Testament professor I ever had, Dr. Dwight Sheets. I am thankful for the undergraduate education in New Testament I received from Dr. Sheets; it was a million times better than what I was offered in seminary. Sheets also writes an excellent blog, even if the posts are not so frequent. It is worth the read.

Further thoughts and comments regarding the article excerpt and link below will be added later, but for now, I’ll simply say, “Those who cite the 1st Century as some sort of proof-text against corporate gatherings, clergy, and apse-like structures might have to re-think some things!” (HT/Bob Hyatt)

Archaeologists in Jordan have unearthed what they claim is the world’s first church, dating back almost 2,000 years, The Jordan Times reported on Tuesday. “We have uncovered what we believe to be the first church in the world, dating from 33 AD to 70 AD,” the head of Jordan’s Rihab Centre for Archaeological Studies, Abdul Qader al-Husan, said. He said it was uncovered under Saint Georgeous Church, which itself dates back to 230 AD, in Rihab in northern Jordan near the Syrian border. “We have evidence to believe this church sheltered the early Christians — the 70 disciples of Jesus Christ,” Husan said. These Christians, who are described in a mosaic as “the 70 beloved by God and Divine,” are said to have fled persecution in Jerusalem and founded churches in northern Jordan, Husan added.

Friend, fellow Lancaster dweller, and awesome-design-guy Kyle Sollenberger just launched what promises to be a fantastic new blog called Church Management Apps. Why? Because he is fed up with how the church family communicates! I am too! So, I’ll be a regular at Church Management Apps for sure. If I were you, I’d subscribe to the feed too, because Kyle is well informed and excellent at what he does. This is a great blog in the making.