Ted Olsen

@tedolsen.bsky.social

1186 Followers 675 Following

Amateur Christian. Formerly: Associate Publisher and Editorial Director for Media and Trade Books, @ivpress.bsky.social; Executive Editor (etc) at @christianitytoday.com

The September 1929 issue of The Betty Weakland Magazine
The chocolateless kind of Smarties
Air Quality Index is 395 on a 500-point scale. Well into the "Hazardous" range.
A map of Chicagoland on lightningmaps.org, showing thousands of dots representing lightning over last 24 hours
Psalm 10:12-16 Rise up, O Lord; lift up your hand, O God; * do not forget the afflicted. Why should the wicked revile God? * why should they say in their heart, “You do not care”? Surely, you behold trouble and misery; * you see it and take it into your own hand. The helpless commit themselves to you, * for you are the helper of orphans. Break the power of the wicked and evil; * search out their wickedness until you find none.
From that extraordinary act of strategic self-definition flowed the necessary tactics. “We were going to be rid of segregation,” [Diane Nash] later said. “One of the things that I have learned over the years is that you really can’t change anyone but yourself and what we did in the South was change ourselves from people who could be segregated into people who could no longer be segregated. The attitude became ‘well kill us if that’s what you’re going to do, but you cannot segregate us any longer’ and once you change yourself the world has to fit up against the new you.” From "Waging a Good War: A Military History of the Civil Rights Movement," by Thomas E. Ricks
Israel’s offensive in Gaza included an AI-assisted target-creation platform called 'the Gospel' which produces potential targets so fast some Israeli officers have compared it to a “mass assassination factory”.
Financial Times: "Eventually, Jennifer would feel an immense sense of relief every time she saw Frodo throw the One Ring — an unbearable relic only he can carry — into the fires of Mount Doom." (Frodo does not, in fact, throw the One Ring into Mount Doom.)
Tomorrow morning, Christian clergy will be holding a communion service in front of the ICE Detention center in Broadview, IL. In our liturgies, we say that “they will come from north and south, east and west to sit together at the table in the Kingdom of God.” The communion table is a welcome table. All are invited. A nation which prohibits the movement of the peoples to gather at that table is by definition obstructing our religious practice and infringing on our right to practice our Christian faith freely. All are invited to join in this ancient ritual, which acknowledges the violence which an empire visited upon our Lord Jesus Christ. Yet his death and resurrection inaugurated the world we yearn for. The truth is that the Beloved Community is here—I see it gathering outside Broadview week after week to demand and exhort the release of our captive neighbors and their restoration to our communities, so that the Welcome Table of this Eucharist might be made whole. I hope you will join us.
“My grandbabies, they said, ‘Grandma, my skin’s burning,’” the woman recalled. The woman said she turned off the air conditioning to try to keep the chemicals from coming through the vents. Days later, she could not describe the smell of the gas. Just that “it burns” and that it made her chest hurt. She couldn’t be sure, though, whether the pain was from the chemicals or the fear.
Jay Kim, the lead pastor at WestGate Church in the Bay Area, who has had a front-row seat to the new attention to Christianity emerging in Silicon Valley, said Thiel’s focus on the Antichrist is misplaced. “My best understanding is that the New Testament writers focus very little, if at all, on pointing followers of Jesus towards spending their energy on accurately identifying the Antichrist,” he said. “To give all your energy into thinking about all that, to me, feels like a pretty futile endeavor.”
2 Kings 17:32-33, 41: They worshiped the Lord, but they also appointed all sorts of their own people to officiate for them as priests in the shrines at the high places. They worshiped the Lord, but they also served their own gods in accordance with the customs of the nations from which they had been brought. … Even while these people were worshiping the Lord, they were serving their idols. To this day their children and grandchildren continue to do as their ancestors did.
NYT: "at the [VIP area of the] memorial service for Charlie Kirk … Kyle Rittenhouse, who was embraced by the right after fatally shooting two people during protests in Wisconsin in 2020, posed for photos."
Rev. David Black of Chicago's First Prebyterian Church is shot in the head with a pepper ball munition during protests at ICE's processing facility in Broadview. Video: https://bsky.app/profile/mskellymhayes.bsky.social/post/3lzad2f5gnk2n
David Black, pastor of First Presbyterian Church, is sprayed directly in the face with tear gas at the ICE processing facility in Broadview. Photo by Ashlee Rezin of the Chicago Sun-Times.
David Black, pastor of First Presbyterian Church of Chicago, is sprayed directly in the face by a masked ICE agent during protests outside the ICE processing facility in Broadview, Illinois. Photo by Ashlee Rezin of the Chicago Sun-Times.
I am not trying to honor people when I write their obituaries. That’s a common misconception I hear from both readers who love what I do and those who are offended and feel betrayed. The job of an obit, as I understand it, is different from a tribute, reminiscence, or eulogy. An obit tries to explain the significance of the recently deceased and the role that person played in shaping the world we live in.
buncha dang kids on a segway tour on the mall
From Jonathan Eig's "King: A Life": On February 10, on national television, he declared the arrival of a new American Negro, “a person with a new sense of dignity and destiny with a new self-respect.” The new American Negro possessed courage, he said. The new American Negro refused to pay lip service to the white man. The new American Negro “says in no uncertain terms that he doesn’t like the way he’s being treated” and intends to do something about it. King’s calm tone and conservative attire may have disguised the boldness of his words: “I think it’s better to be aggressive at this point,” he said. “It seems to me that it is both historically and sociologically true that privileged classes do not give up their privileges voluntarily. And they do not give them up without strong resistance.” The interviewer asked if strong resistance would generate more white retaliation. “Well,” King said, “I think that is a necessary phase of the transition.”
Photo: LA Times
a screencap of New York Times articles tagged "Runaway Zebreas"
The destruction of Rafah
It's just a lion in a zoo but he's worked hard to get his long black hair in front of his face, giving emo
A great many people (not you) do now seem to think that the mere state of being worried is in itself meritorious. I don't think it is. We must, if it so happens, give our lives for others: but even while we're doing it, I think we're meant to enjoy Our Lord and, in Him, our friends, our food, our sleep, our jokes, and the birds' song, and the frosty sunrise. About the distant, so about the future. It is very dark: but there's usually light enough for the next step or so. Pray for me always." — C.S. Lewis in "Letter to Bede Griffiths" dated 20 December 1946.
Jeremiah 5:26-31: “Among my people are the wicked who lie in wait like men who snare birds and like those who set traps to catch people. Like cages full of birds, their houses are full of deceit; they have become rich and powerful and have grown fat and sleek. Their evil deeds have no limit; they do not seek justice. They do not promote the case of the fatherless; they do not defend the just cause of the poor. Should I not punish them for this?” declares the LORD. “Should I not avenge myself on such a nation as this? A horrible and shocking thing has happened in the land: The prophets prophesy lies, the priests rule by their own authority, and my people love it this way. But what will you do in the end?”
7 Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him; do not fret when people succeed in their ways, when they carry out their wicked schemes. 8 Refrain from anger and turn from wrath; do not fret—it leads only to evil. 9 For those who are evil will be destroyed, but those who hope in the Lord will inherit the land. 10 A little while, and the wicked will be no more; though you look for them, they will not be found. 11 But the meek will inherit the land and enjoy peace and prosperity. 12 The wicked plot against the righteous and gnash their teeth at them; 13 but the Lord laughs at the wicked, for he knows their day is coming. (Psalm 37:7–13, NIV)
"I suppose that even the most violent critic would agree that it is well for us to have friends in the world, to encourage them to oppose communism both in its external form and in its internal manifestations, to promote trade in the world that would be mutually profitable between us and our friends (and it must be mutually profitable or it will dry up), and to attempt the promotion of peace in the world, negotiating from a position of moral, intellectual, economic and military strength."
A bunch of hippos at rest
When Robert Whaples, an economist at Wake Forest University, published an article in 2006 about the imperative to eliminate America’s 1-cent coin, he received a personal note: “Get it done, and you will deserve the Nobel Prize!” The note was from Paul Volcker, the former chairman of the Federal Reserve, in which capacity he technically oversaw the annual ordering of billions of pennies from the Mint for distribution among the American populace.
Any Peeler speaks on a panel on IVP’s The New Testament in Color, at the Calvin Symposium on Worship, alongside moderator Kathy Smith, Dennis R. Edwards, Janette H. Ok, and Osvaldo Padilla.
The cover of the book "Easter" by Wesley Hill, published by InterVarsity Press
Screenshot of World magazine article: "What is America exactly? Is it merely an economic zone? Is it simply a matter of geography, such that if you find yourself on American soil, you are entitled to the rights of citizenship? Or is America a nation and a people with a shared history, culture, and attachment to a place that can be defended against encroachment and invasion? Finally, President Trump’s immigration orders pose a question for the American people. As he ends Biden-era policies that expedite migrant entry and sets the stage for deportation efforts, how will the American people respond when media outlets show image after image of tearful migrants being detained and removed from the country? Will the American people have the fortitude to resist the manipulation of our pity and empathy by journalists and activists who wish to sabotage the president’s efforts to secure our nation’s borders?"
Book cover for The Crazies by Amy Gamerman
A sandy beach with waves, photo taken from a moving Amtrak train.