For details on the giveaway please read the very bottom of the post. Only comments made at the World of Apple publication of this review will be entered for a chance to win a free copy.



Accordance by OakTree Software is one of those massively powerful programs that causes me to think, "Where to begin?" Let's start with introductions. Readers, Accordance 8 is a highly flexible and in-depth program for studying the Bible, commentaries, and related reference tools—including maps—with the ability to conduct extraordinarily complex searches. Its functions meet the needs of the layperson up through the scholar starting with simple translation comparisons all the way to delving into the original languages behind the English translations of the text. Those two sentences, however, do not do this program justice. As I have stated in the past, I am a fairly new Mac convert, joining the cult family in about May 2007 after nearly twenty years of Windows usage since Windows 3.1. Prior to my switch, my Biblical software of choice was the very popular Logos program—particularly the Scholar's Library. Logos did the job, but I did not find it particularly intuitive—and no matter how useful a program may be once mastered, if mastery becomes a chore, I lose interest and motivation. This is why I remain a mediocre Photoshop user. Although there are a ton of resources and conventions and blah, blah, blah to learn the program, I do not care for any software that requires the time of maintaining a second husband to understand. This fact does, however, have to be balanced with the reality that complex programs do have a learning curve, but a good developer will minimize that curve as much as possible and thoroughly equip the user with tools to quickly navigate that painful period. I am very pleased to report that Accordance has done this with true faithfulness to continuity with the Macintosh GUI. While I had recently learned that Logos is being developed for the Macintosh platform, and my (expensive) license is transferable, unless something has greatly changed with their user interface, I do not anticipate ceasing... [Read More]

Written by

Catherine Ramey

Christians have a tough task these days.
BANG!
A bullet flies and a man is dead.
There was a time when it could be expected that the body on the floor was, perhaps, some innocent man caught in the crossfire during a burglary or a dispute that got out of control. Maybe he was a gang member or gangster who would have gotten the other guy if he hadn't been laid cold first. Sympathies are easy to direct in those kinds of cases.

In the old days it was easy to distinguish good guys and bad guys. But these days one can neither assume the innocence of the body on the floor or the moral guilt of the shooter. A radical shift in our cultural worldview makes placing proper biblical blame a weighty task.

Take the October 23, 1998 killing of an Amherst, New York man as a case in point.

Just back from synagogue worship where they memorialized the ninth anniversary of his father's death, Bart Slepian stirred a bowl of soup hot out of the microwave. The steam hit his face and felt good after being out in the chilly autumn air. His voice only slightly raised, he kept up a conversation with one of his sons, a 15-year-old who stood just beyond the doorway.

Only a second later his bowl of soup and the man were cast across the kitchen floor, vegetables and broth mingling with blood.
Bart Slepian had been shot in the back, bullet fragments exploding into both lungs. The next moments were—no doubt—hell in slow motion for his family as police and an ambulance were called. Maybe Lynne Slepian cradled her husband's head and offered reassurances to the four boys and herself despite the growing pool of red and the sound of Bart Slepian struggling for air.

Then there was the panicked call one of the children made to Mrs. Slepian's father. In a confusion of words the boy fought to tell his grandfather that his son-in-law was hurt, maybe dying of injuries sustained by somebody haunting the family's dark backyard.
Immediately one feels sympathy for those caught in such a dreadful situation. Suddenly four sons—Andrew, Brian, Michael, and Philip—are facing life without a father and a wife is now looking at widowhood. It is a tragedy to all, and one of mammoth proportions to those living through the events of October 23. It is something that will haunt them the way that John's death haunted Jackie Kennedy.

But... [Read More]