Skip to content ↓

A La Carte (July 29)

Today’s Kindle deals include 3 books I highly recommend: The Gospel by Ray Ortlund; Core Christianity by Michael Horton; and Church History 101 by Sinclair Ferguson, Joel Beeke, and Michael Haykin. You can find the deals right here.

On the print book side, Westminster Books has a great sale on the venerable NICNT commentary series. You can build yourself a commentary collection in a hurry with these volumes. (For specific commentary recommendations, you can visit my Best Commentaries page.

Godly Compassion for Hurting People

John MacArthur describes “a wonderful, practical, real-life illustration of God’s compassion.”

The Word of God and the Academy

Tim Grant: “I have noticed that those from the academy give the impression that the Bible belongs to them—that they have a special claim on it and that they have a special claim to understand it, due to their great learning, general smartness, or a PhD they completed at some point in the past. They are, at this point, deeply mistaken.”

The Camera Adds 10 Pounds

You’ve heard it said before that the camera adds 10 pounds. This quite gif shows how that’s the case. It’s all about the lens!

Touched by Biblical Beauty

George Guthrie: “The world may be ‘death impregnated,’ as one of my mentors used to say, and most of us know the bite of suffering in one form or another, but it also is brim-full of beauty because it everywhere bears the mark of his thumbprint, his “It was very good” (Gen. 1:31). The common graces of tastes, sights, touch, sounds, enduring friendship, love, joy, community. And much, much beauty has been squeezed into the world through the funnel of God’s good Word, the Bible.”

This Day in 1775. 241 years ago today, the U.S. Army Chaplaincy was founded, making it the second oldest branch of that service after the Infantry. *

The Attractional Church’s Growing Irrelevance

Jared Wilson does what he does so well: “I find it incredibly interesting, sort of amusing, and more than a bit sad that the attractional church—what we used to call the “seeker church”—hasn’t seemed to grow up at all. Yes, it’s grown big. But growing big and growing up aren’t the same thing.”

The Rearview Mirror

“We see Providence in the rearview mirror. In my experience, it is usually far less clear looking over the dashboard. It’s when we look back that we can see how God was working all things together for his glory and our good.”

Trumped

Despite the title, this is not really an article about Trump. It is, in fact, about the church and a role the church ought to play.

Flashback: Why We Fail at Family Devotions

Here are some common reasons that we fail in our good desire to have family devotions.

Carson

If we harbor bitterness and resentment, praying is little more than wasted time and effort.

—D.A. Carson

  • Four Years After Our Hardest Day

    Four Years After Our Hardest Day

    Yesterday marked four years since Nick went to heaven. I find myself calling him “Nicky” more often now—a name I hadn’t used for him since he was a child. I wonder if it reflects that in some ways he is becoming dearer to my heart and younger to my mind. After all, I keep aging…

  • A La Carte Collection cover image

    A La Carte (November 4)

    A La Carte: A reassured heart / Alistair Begg with biblical wisdom for voting / Unveiling the true nature of grumbling / Kevin DeYoung on double predestination / Kindle deals / and more.

  • Educated, Free, Wealthy, and Privileged

    We are an educated people with high standards of literacy. We are a free people who enjoy religious liberty. We are a wealthy people with unlimited access to a nearly infinite quantity of Bibles. We are a privileged people who may not realize how blessed we are.

  • A La Carte Collection cover image

    Weekend A La Carte (November 2)

    A La Carte: Coldplay’s prayer in Melbourne / Zombies, Heath Lambert, and gatekeeping biblical counseling / Keep the Feast (a new song) / Stop playing the numbers game / Squandering security / and more.

  • Giveaways / Free Stuff Fridays Collection cover image

    Free Stuff Fridays (Ligonier)

    This week’s Free Stuff Friday is sponsored by Ligonier Ministries, who also sponsored the blog this week.  Yesterday was Reformation Day, when many Protestants celebrate the sixteenth-century recovery of the biblical gospel. It was while Martin Luther was studying the book of Romans that he rediscovered the doctrine of justification by faith alone. So, today…

  • Daily Liturgy Devotional

    Why Not Use a Daily Liturgy for Your Devotions?

    Trends come and go. Certain habits or interests rise for a time, wane, then rise again, often at unexpected moments. One of the recent trends I have found particularly surprising and also particularly interesting is the rise (or re-rise, if you prefer) of liturgy. This may be liturgy within formal worship services of the local…