There are many reasons I love being a Christian, but right up there is being able to learn from others how to think in mature, biblical ways. Recently my friends Ewan and Rachel welcomed a new baby boy into their family, and immediately experienced a shock as they realized he had a significant physical malformation.…
Perhaps the most difficult thing to accept about marriage is that marriage will end–that it is, in the words of John Piper, merely momentary. I get 20 or 30 or maybe 60 years with Aileen as my wife, then the rest of eternity without. Honestly, I struggle to see how this can be a good…
Every now and again I like to share an order of worship from Grace Fellowship Church. This service’s cast of characters included Paul (our lead pastor) as the preacher and service leader, Josh as the lead worshipper, and Murray as the elder who led the pastoral prayer. Our band consisted of guitar, piano, and drums…
I acknowledge this is a bit of a weird question, but bear with me for just a minute: Has there ever been a better time to be disabled? I don’t mean to be smart, and I don’t mean to be cute. What I mean to say is that I am not aware of any society…
It’s Reformation Day today. And no ordinary Reformation Day, either. This is the 500th anniversary of the day Martin Luther unintentionally began what would become a worldwide, world-transforming movement. And on this day I’m reflecting on some of my recent travels and how they’ve reinforced my gratitude for the work of Luther and the other…
Are you friends with your friends for the sake of your friends? Or are you friends with your friends for the sake of yourself? I suspect you don’t really know while you derive some clear benefit from the relationship. As long as the relationship is gain, not loss, as long as it enhances your reputation…
I am utterly confident that prayer works, but am far less certain about how prayer works. God invites and commands us to come to him with our petitions, our requests. He promises that he hears them, that through the intercession of the Spirit he perfects them, and that it is his joy to answer them.…
I know I’m prone to feeling sorry for myself and I am quite committed to avoiding the temptation. It is one of those sins that feels like it will feel good but actually just ends up feeling miserable. I know that intellectually—it’s just that tricky matter of implementing it emotionally. So here’s the deal: I’m…
It is our sacred responsibility to examine every doctrine to determine if it is true or false. But how can we distinguish sound doctrine from false? How can we distinguish teachers of truth from teachers of error? Today I have a new video blog for you, and one that deals with this pressing topic: I…
It’s gotten so I almost hate the news. I want to know what’s going on in the world, but I’ve lost confidence that there’s as much as a single organization out there communicating it in a trustworthy way. We hear lots of talk today about fake news, but I’m convinced this is less of a…
Wherever there is truth there will be error. Wherever there are people teaching sound doctrine there will be people teaching false doctrine. Here, in video format, are 7 false teachers in the church today. Here it is for both YouTube and Facebook. (For those wondering, the nerve syndrome that has kept me from being able…
A short time ago I shared a beautiful little poem by John Newton: ‘Tis a Point I Long to Know. In that poem Newton professes the universal experience of the Christian in our searching, our wondering, our perplexity, and, eventually, our confidence. After I posted it, I learned that a friend of Newton’s penned a…
I always enjoy answering the questions that come in through my Ask Me Anything feature. I usually answer them in writing, but as I transition (at least for now) to a video format, I’ve decided to try answering them that way. Here’s the very first video edition of Ask Me Anything. I answer questions about…
It may not be the key New Testament passage on parenting, but it’s definitely one of the most important: “Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.” In this video I talk about it and warn how we, as parents, can provoke our…
I’m doing things a little bit differently today. For now at least, I’ve mostly lost the ability to type, so am going to try my hand at a little bit of video. If you want, you can click play to learn more. Transcript We’ve got lights. We’ve got a camera. We’ve got a microphone. Let’s…
Every now and again I like to share an order of worship from Grace Fellowship Church. This service’s cast of characters included Paul (our lead pastor) as the preacher, Josh as the lead worshipper, Peter (one of our Assistant Ministers) as the service leader, Thushara (one of our deacons) as Scripture-reader, and Steve as the…
In some ways it seems like the New Calvinism has been around for a very long time. In other ways, it seems like it’s still a brand new thing. Whatever the case, it has lasted enough now that people are beginning to trace its roots, evaluate its accomplishments, and project its future. While this has…
There was a time, and it was not so very long ago, that we wanted heroes who were flawless. We would look to the past to find people who had an outsized impact on our world and prepare biographies tipped well in the direction of hagiography. We might read a thousand or two thousand pages…
There is no sin that cannot be overcome, no transgression that cannot be put to death, no consequence so grave it cannot be undone in 365 days. At least, that’s what you might think as you read about pastors and other Christian leaders who rise, fall, and rise again. It’s the unwritten but often-followed “one-year…
Because the weather on Tuesday was wet and gross, we spent most of it combing through museums in Basel and Zurich. We ended up visiting two day’s worth of museums in one, which left today wide open. We decided to make the most of it by heading for the mountains. We left our Airbnb outside…