I have been doing a lot of thinking and writing about conspiracy theory, and it’s all Carl Trueman’s fault. I got an advance copy of his forthcoming book The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self and enjoyed it so much that I decided to go back and read some of his other books. Next…
Each of us is given a race to run. Some are called to run a long race. Some are called to run a short race. What matters is not how long our race is, but how well we run it. It’s God’s business to determine how long we run; it’s our business to determine how…
The Lord’s Supper is an occasion that is both solemn and celebratory. In the Lord’s Supper we remember the suffering and death of the innocent Son of God and we confess that it was our sin that made it necessary. In the Lord’s Supper we rejoice that God made a way for us to be…
Though these have been the two most difficult days of our lives, my family has been immeasurably blessed. We have received encouragement from close friends and distant strangers alike, each telling us of their love and their prayers. (I have gotten more emails and messages than I could ever respond to, but please know I…
In all the years I’ve been writing I have never had to type words more difficult, more devastating than these: Yesterday the Lord called my son to himself—my dear son, my sweet son, my kind son, my godly son, my only son. Nick was playing a game with his sister and fiancée and many other…
Even people who have no use for Jesus affirm the importance of his Golden Rule: “As you wish that others would do to you, do so to them” (Luke 6:31). This is a call for each of us to live thoughtfully, to live selflessly, to live in such a way that we consider not only…
This week’s Free Stuff Fridays is sponsored by Ligonier Ministries and Reformation Trust, who also sponsored the blog this week. Martin Luther is one of the most significant figures in church history. The movement that started after his posting of the Ninety-Five Theses led to the recovery of the gospel. How did this happen? How…
Many Christians can attest that of all the resources that have deepened their understanding of God’s Word, few have proven more important than a really good study Bible. A study Bible combines the text of Scripture with notes that help with both interpretation and application. Of course we acknowledge that there is a distinction between…
We don’t have little kids around here anymore. In fact, most of the time we now just have one kid around here, and she’s well beyond the little years. We’ve moved past parenting tiny children and into parenting young adults. Toilet training, bike-riding, and grade school drama have given way to navigating graduate programs, assessing…
We are easily influenced. It is a feature of humanity (and not a bug) that we learn best by example, by imitation. We are natural imitators and thrive on a combination of formal instruction and observable example. It is little wonder then that we cast about for teachers, for mentors, for people who can influence…
It was in the darkest of days that God spoke the most glorious of words: “The God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed, nor shall the kingdom be left to another people. It shall break in pieces all these kingdoms and bring them to an end, and it shall…
I quite often have people get in touch to ask me for tips on blogging. (No, blogs aren’t dead and yes, there is still a place for blogs in 2020. To that end, the forthcoming book Blogging for God’s Glory in a Clickbait World is worthy of a pre-order.) Earlier this year I offered some…
Irecently pointed out that new conspiracy theories tend to arise around shifts in power and that they often originate from those who have lost power or seen their power threatened. As you worked your way through that article, I wonder if you noticed that I didn’t define “conspiracy theory,” something that, in retrospect, may have…
I recently discovered Readwise, an app that has a neat feature—it sends a daily email with a randomized selection of highlights from books in my Kindle library. This has proven an interesting way to encounter information I have read but long-since forgotten. A few days ago Readwise surfaced a quote from a book I read…
We are just weeks away from another contentious American election, which means we are just weeks away from roughly half of the American population savoring a great victory and the other half suffering a great loss. This being the case, we are, in all likelihood, just weeks away from the birth of new conspiracy theories.…
I am a master at identifying sin. I might be tempted to brag about that fact, except for this: While I’m a master at identifying the sin in other people, I’m a mere novice at identifying the sin in myself. And I don’t think I’m the only one. There seems to be something deeply embedded…
When I was young my family owned a cottage. To a child it was a place of wonder, a place of marvels. While I spent ten months of the year in the confines of the big city, summers at the cottage offered freedom to explore and to discover, to be a wanderer and adventurer, to…
The culture around us may not have much knowledge of the Bible, but everyone still seems to know and freely quote these words: “Judge not.” People may not know much, but they do know that the Bible strictly warns against standing in judgment against anyone else. Christians expend no little effort in explaining how “judge…
I have mentioned before that one key element of worship at Grace Fellowship Church (and in traditional Protestant services) is the Call to Worship. Often our calls to worship involve simply reading a passage of the Bible, but other times we combine several texts in a kind of question and answer format. In this case…
You’ve probably had this experience with one of your children—the experience of trying to explain something that was a part of your childhood, but is completely foreign to theirs. Though we aren’t that far removed from the years when we were young, the pace of technological change has been unparalleled. What was mind-blowing in the…