Paul Mulner

No minimizing the benefits in the least - do what makes you feel good. Funny we now call this intermittent fasting. I haven’t eaten b-fast most days for 40 years. Even w/night snacks, 15 hours to lunch is normal. What a “terrible decision” to ”skip the most important meal of the day!” ;-)

Almost a year ago, I began daily intermittent fasting from food (clearly not coffee), primarily driven by a desire to focus on health &, to be honest, a bit of curiosity. Living in abundance, I found it easy to overeat. I had friend’s who regularly fasted & it always intrigued me. Over the past year, my fasting routine has been relatively mild compared to others. My goal is to fast for 15 hours beginning from dinner each evening. If I can’t maintain that duration, I don’t feel guilty. Some days I can go longer. If I’m having breakfast with someone, I break my fast early. In short, I don’t make it awkward socially. I use an app on my phone to track what I am eating (when you log what you eat, you really pay attention to it). A few months ago, I decided to skip intentional fasting on Sundays. As a Christian, Sunday’s are a day of feasting. While the health benefits have been positive for me, I’ve discovered two unexpected advantages that I hadn’t anticipated when I started intermittent fasting: 1. Enhanced Mental Clarity: Fasting has given me a unique mental clarity in the mornings. 2. Appreciation for Food and God’s Provision: I’ve realized that my body wasn’t accustomed to going without food. I rarely felt hungry, I whenever I did, I would quickly satisfy ( or over satisfy) my cravings. However, once I started intermittent fasting, I developed a different appreciation for the goodness of food & the blessings of God’s provision. I’m not a medical professional, so my musings on my health are just that - not advice. I’m not sure if I’ll continue this practice, & there may be times when it would be unwise to do so. Nevertheless, it has been beneficial for me over the past year.

@SketchesbyBoze Or it’s just a speech to text error? Isn’t that the simplest explanation?

You can be pretty confident that someone doesn’t read when they say “raped over at Kohl’s” rather than “raked over the coals.” As literacy declines, we are seeing new & unparalleled malapropisms.

@tedstur @JeffVanderstelt Yes, Jesus asked questions. Your claim of “not the one way pre-planned sermons we have today” is the problem. When you compare Jesus’ daily messianic ministry to the weekly patterns of corporate worship for the church he established you make multiple category errors.

@pauldmulner @JeffVanderstelt I have spreadsheets!!

I received no small amount of pushback from a recent Tweet. A few questioned the validity of the statement. I decided to do some research and discovered there is reason to question the 5% retention from lecture claim.

@tedstur @JeffVanderstelt Jesus didn’t do Q&A with large groups, he preached. As did the apostles. As did the early church. As has the church for 2k years. As scripture commands. But you do you.

@JeffVanderstelt Teach like Jesus: he asked and answered questions. His lectures were interactive and spontaneous, not the one-way preplanned sermons that we have today. Nothing wrong with sermons but they leave a lot on the table.

@PJ_Cahill That’s a shame, because your tweet is both true and gracious in its precision and restraint. His is false and uncharitable.

From here on Ken will do my tweets (I was trying to say this)

@WojoKen @PJ_Cahill Thanks for the ungracious take. I just taught the opposite of this today in Sunday school.

@PJ_Cahill An Independent Presbyterian Church cannot exist, unless one forgets what Presbyterian means. And if they have forgotten what Presbyterian means, then they are not Presbyterian.

Fundamentally, an independent church cannot have a full Presbyterian polity. There is no higher court to appeal the decisions of a lower court.

@PastorJChester 2 is why the pro-sabbatical people look so bad in this discussion.

I don't know why but my timeline is full of people talking about pastoral sabbaticals. Let me say 3 things. 1. I've never taken a sabbatical. 2. Yes, faithful pastors work harder than you. 3. Pastoral sabbaticals are a local church decision.

@AdamPage85 Or 4) we just disagree with you about sabbaticals and that’s okay.

I have been at my church 12 years. For my tenth year my church gifted me a 4 week sabbatical to use. This was outside my given annual vacation time. So kind. I will use it this year. I do not ask for or require a yearly sabbatical on top of annual vacation time, I honestly lead a church and have four kids. I don’t even think I COULD take that much time off. But no. There is absolutely nothing wrong with a shepherd who gives his life to his sheep, being gifted time away (occasionally) by his congregation. I’d argue a lot of the dudes attacking the concept of a sabbatical, are either 1) strictly online theologians with no ordination to the office, 2) Preach full time but don’t truly shepherd and invest in family after family, 3) or they are trying to find elitism in places they shouldn’t for a number of different reasons, one being, their church deacons who run the show don’t wanna gift them one so they have to keep the illusion of control and act like all sabbaticals are bad.

i saw someone use ai;dr earlier in response to a post and i think we need to make this a more widely-used abbreviation

Ok brother, do you think you could make Outlook search work when you have a minute?

@LutheranSage It’s not about “appropriate-ness.” It’s about idiomatic expressions. They’re never correctly translated literally at the word level. If translating from English to another language would a word for word translation of “get your ducks in a row” communicate real meaning?

Translators remove words for the sake of *appropriateness*. "Well surely they aren't talking about my ESV/NKJV/NASB!" Think again...

I watched a guy run a sub-six-minute mile pace ... uphill ... on skis while I ate a Reese's Blizzard from Dairy Queen (with extra Reese's)

Turned on the tv to look at the weather report and just learned that MTV plays classic (80s-90s) music videos from 6-7am. I fear this knowledge will negatively impact my morning routine going forward.

@jasonkovacs “The prayers of the saints are the fuel of the church’s ministry.” A great man.

In seminary Dr. Doug Kelly told us pastors and future pastors that the church should have three meetings every week: Sunday morning Sunday evening Wednesday night prayer He emphasized the centrality of the preached Word but also the critical role of the prayer meeting to ensure our dependence on the power of the Holy Spirit. I think of that often.

@AKofiCup Poor Holy Spirit. I guess he’s only capable of working in pulpits on Sunday and can’t do any work in the pastor‘s study during the week!

I try reading a book a quarter on preaching, just to stay sharp. I won't name the current one but it annoys me when I read statements like this: "A manuscript generally quenches the free movement of the Holy Spirit on a preacher while preaching." On what basis???

@griffingulledge We’re doing a Zoom prayer meeting on Sunday. My 2 cents: Nothing wrong with your Friday additional service but viewing it online isn’t worship and it’s good for us to do something interactive together on the Lord’s Day.

We are doing something unique. Terrible winter storm is headed our way and the likelihood of canceling church on Sunday is high. Instead of doing livestream only, we’re moving worship to Friday night at 6:30 PM, and then broadcasting that on Sunday for those who can’t make it.

Well, this is a scam I hadn’t encountered before. Multiple fake Lululemon accounts replied to my post asking me to follow back for direct support. Interesting.

Pro tip if you have to deal with @lululemon - call in. Completely worthless series of weeks-long errors to process a simple return. Nice lady on the phone had it fixed in 10 minutes after 30 days of email/chat futility. "Thummeti" on chat claimed not be AI, but I'm not so sure.

@MKaminskiMusic Just keep up the Phish puns please.

Thank you so much for all the compliments and for wanting me back for another year! Are there any songs that you’d like to hear this season?

@xtianherring We were in Louisville this year for a music festival and had a wonderful experience worshipping at communitypca.org. Not sure if that’s whose website offended you, but I’d encourage you to have some grace with a church because of an author or two on their resources page.

There are 4 NAPARC churches in Louisville, KY 1 is ARP and 3 are PCA One of the PCAs is Korean language only Another PCA has FV stuff on their website None of them have an evening service What an embarrassment