So a friend of mine saw a rather strange item on my Amazon wishlist and decided he would, as a bit of a gag I suppose, buy it for me. And so in today’s mail I found a copy of “Your Best Life Now: The Game.” The box declares that it is “Inspired by the…
There have been a couple of times in the past few years that I have written about spiritual gifts and spiritual gift inventories. These articles continue to be read (thanks, I suppose, to the efforts of search engines) and, since I have given a great deal more thought to this subject, I wanted to update…
Last month, in an article entitled By Our Books Shall We Be Known, I discussed some commentary Al Mohler wrote based on an essay that appeared in The Chronicle of Higher Education. The purpose of the article was, quite simply, to show that there is a lot you can tell about a person by the…
Those who had the privilege of attending the Together for the Gospel Conference, or who listened to the audio recordings (available here in MP3 or CD format), no doubt remember C.J. Mahaney’s plenary session which was entitled “Watch Your Life and Doctrine.” He took as his text 1 Timothy 4:16 which reads: “Keep a close…
As I read Marsden’s biography of Jonthan Edwards last week, I was stopped short several times by Edwards’ wisdom. Constantly surrounded by conflict, and often facing people who sought to undermine his ministry, Edwards had every opportunity to reflect on the task of a minister. During his ministry, one conflict involved whether sermons should primarily…
By now you have heard of the scandal involving Ted Haggard. Reaction to the news has ranged from sympathy to disgust, from support to condemnation. The media has dedicated a lot of attention to this story, though they seem to be writing about it as just another news story rather than something that is somehow…
King for a Week is an honor I bestow on blogs that I feel are making a valuable contribution to my faith and the faith of other believers. Every week (in theory) I select a blog, link to it from my site, and add that site’s most recent headlines to my left sidebar. While this…
I read and review a lot of books. You already know this. I have been pleased to find that other Christians able to benefit from my love of reading through these reviews. I’ve received a lot of encouragement from people who have purchased books based on my recommendation and have been blessed by them. It…
This is the second article in a series dealing with the Five Points of Calvinism and attempting to draw some fresh application from them. I anticipate that each of the five points will merit two articles. The first article dealing with the T in TULIP can be found here. Today we will seek personal application…
Today is Reformation Day, the day we celebrate the beginning of the Protestant Reformation. October 31 stands as the day that Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses to the door of the castle church in Wittenberg. Luther, when he did this, surely had no apprehension of just how significant an event this would be. And…
Yesterday morning my pastor preached on Romans 12-13 under the heading of “Cross-Centered Authenticity.” Though I missed much of the first half of the sermon walking the halls with a fussy baby, I returned in time to hear the end of the first (and longest) point and the final four points. I am glad I…
Halloween is fast approaching, and I am beginning to see articles on this always-popular topic in the blogosphere. I wrote about this for the first time last year and thought I would follow that article with a similar one, but one that is hopefully a little more developed as I’ve had another year to think…
King for a Week is an honor I bestow on blogs that I feel are making a valuable contribution to my faith and the faith of other believers. Every week (in theory) I select a blog, link to it from my site, and add that site’s most recent headlines to my left sidebar. While this…
I was talking with my father this morning, and the conversation turned to John Eldredge. I told dad about Eldredge’s newest book (it has, after all, recently hit store shelves and I had just copied my rather negative review to Amazon.), The Way of the Wild Heart and how Eldredge seems to be heading to…
This review is appearing in the current edition of the Journal of Modern Ministry (edited by Dr. Jay Adams). You can view the Journal’s site here. Though I am still relatively young, I am old enough to remember libraries that relied upon card catalogs. In the days before computers were used to index and organize…
October 31, just two weeks from now, will mark the 489th anniversary of the day that Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses to the door of the church at Wittenburg. In so doing he struck a match, beginning a fire that quickly spread throughout Europe and throughout the world. Having become increasingly disillusioned with the…
Blogs have provided a unique platform for a great many people. As blogs have gained some degree of credibility beyond the blogosphere, members of the mainstream media often turn to bloggers for opinions. A lot of bloggers, despite losing confidence in the mainstream media, still consider a mention in a major magazine or newspaper to…
You may have had opportunity by this time to browse through Christianity Today’s “The Top 50 Books That Have Shaped Evangelicals.” “These are books that have shaped evangelicalism as we see it today–not an evangelicalism we wish and hope for. Books that have been published since World War II–not every book in the history of…
I thought it would be interesting to contrast two books I have received in the past weeks. The first quote is from Steve Lawson’s Foundations of Grace which I wrote about a couple of days ago. In this quote he contrasts Calvinism and Arminianism: Never have two systems of thought been more polarized. The first…
There seems to be a great deal of disagreement about how we ought to define the word discernment. A quick Google check reveals a wide variety. One says it is “perception of that which is obscure” and another says “the ability to feel or perceive something with the use of the mind and the senses.”…