This week’s Christian Carnival, Carnival #… (pause, pause, making sense of the L’s and X’s) 74 is up here at Daddypundit’s blog.

My submission this week is a post, which started out as a comment at SmartChristian’s blog, reflecting on the common view that the story of Mary and Martha in Luke 10 teaches that there is a spiritual priority for quiet reflection and listening over active works of service. I cast doubt on this pervasive view and offer an alternative.

The Carnival opens with an interesting announcement from Adrian Warnock about the new initiative that he is spearheading to consolidate the efforts of Christian bloggers of all stripe and sizes. This new Blogdom of God enterprise ranks blogs based on popularity as defined by links from other Christian bloggers.

Responding to several of bloggers‘ complaints of Apple Company’s Steven Jobs’ recent commencement speech (also highlighted by Michelle Malkin)where he apparently glorified work, human effort, postmodernism’s anti-dogmatism and Eastern mysticism’s acquiescence with death, Mike McLoughlin of Faith at Work blog pronounced:

A person’s story, no matter how devoid of faith it may appear, is actually a story of God at work. There is no part of creation where Christ is not present and at work. (Colossians 1:15-20). Each human being is created in God’s image (Genesis 1:26-27) and has the potential to glorify God in their life (Isaiah 43:5-8). God even uses fallen human beings to care for his created order. I respectfully submit that this is exactly what He has done with Steve Jobs.

McLoughlin argues refreshingly that God’s grace and mercy are not limited to a favored group of people. It is temptingly deceptive to think God only uses the elect for His purposes and that God is only glorified by the lives of people who subscribe to a particular set of beliefs. Even if someone espouses belief systems that may be contrary to our liking, or to our denominational preferences, or even, to our understanding of biblical principles, yet this person’s life may and can actually be used by God to bless many.

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