Today is the 100th anniversary of the birth of Francis Schaeffer. Though I never met the man and though I haven’t read more than small pieces of his books, I owe a great debt of gratitude to him. Schaeffer shaped me by first shaping my parents. To mark this date I asked my parents if…
Over the past two days I have been writing about Ephesians 5 and the great mystery of marriage–that in some way marriage is a portrait, a reflection, of the relationship of Christ to his church. In the first article I introduced this metaphor and in the second I spoke about how the wife completes her…
Yesterday I began a short series called A Picture-Perfect Marriage. This is my attempt to study what Paul says about the marriage relationship being a picture, a portrait of Christ and the church. Having laid that foundation, I now want to look at how the wife fulfills her part of that portrait. Here is what…
This morning I am going to begin just a short series of articles on marriage. Having read several books on marriage in the past few months, I found myself really intrigued by what Paul says about the topic in his letter to the Ephesians. I’ve since had the opportunity to study it and wanted to…
In his answer last week as to whether all jobs have the same intrinsic value, Matt Perman made the distinction between economic value and moral value: Not all jobs have the same economic value because, clearly, some jobs pay more than others. But this doesn’t make some jobs more important than others, because all jobs…
It has come as kind of a shock to me, now that I am a pastor and preaching on a regular basis, that the vast majority of the sermons I preach will be rather ordinary. I will study hard and pray hard and work hard, I’ll get started early in the week and give it…
Yesterday I wrote about Satan’s Great Desire which is to bring about disunity in your local church, somehow convincing you that the people in your church are no longer worthy of your love. I ended by giving the encouragement that God has equipped us to build and maintain this kind of unity and that all…
I have been engaged in a study of the second half of Paul’s letter to the Ephesians, and, not surprisingly, the themes from that letter have been resonating in my mind over the past few weeks. I have been struck by Paul’s emphasis on the importance of love and unity in the local church. On…
This is my once-monthly Puritan post. I know that I’ve lost 50% of you with the word Puritan, but don’t be too hasty to run away; if you take the time to read this post, I know that you’ll benefit from it. I am simply sharing some of what John Owen says about putting sin…
Acts 12 contains one of my favorite stories of the early church. It is a great little bit of writing–a short story in three acts. I was reflecting on that story recently and just had to tell you about it. The chapter begins with a description of Herod’s persecution against the church. In order to…
There is no greater challenge in all the earth than living the Christian life. There is no challenge more difficult, no pursuit that demands more of us. Of course there is also no better pursuit and no greater joy than this—to seek the Lord. In the midst of this all-consuming task, it is wise to…
Yesterday I wrote about Christians and money and tried to give an answer to 2 questions: Do I have to give some of my money away? and What should my attitude be as I give my money away? You can find that article here. Today I want to continue this little 2-part series by asking…
Last week I wrote a little bit about money, trying to point out 4 of the ways that we, as Christians, tend to think about money and possessions in worldly ways. Today I want to follow that up with what the Bible says about giving and tithing. God gives us money and tells us to…
Throughout this fall I have been able to spend some time teaching my church about money. One of the first challenges I faced was in distinguishing between what the Bible teaches about money and what we, as Christians living in this time and this place, tend to believe. What I found is that there are…
This is my once-monthly Puritan post. I know that I’ve lost 50% of you with the word Puritan, but don’t be too hasty to run away; if you take the time to read this post, I am convinced you’ll benefit from it. I can say that on good authority because the essence of the post…
This “occupy” movement has made headlines all over the world–far more headlines than it deserves based on the actual number of people participating. A little while ago I came across an interesting little video, a piece of street theater generated by some of the participants of Occupy Wall Street. They call it simply, “Life Under…
The relationship of Christians and alcohol is one of those perennial issues. It has often been the source of heated disagreement and even separation. It is a particularly important topic in the United States, but, since much of the rest of the world is culturally downstream from the U.S., it effects every Christian to some…
In 1981, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta published a report saying that they had identified, without probable cause, five cases of a rare strain of pneumonia among men in Los Angeles. By the following July, this disease, now appearing in isolated pockets around the world, was given the name Acquired Immune…
I’ve had it on my heart this week to write about hope and joy. To do that I’ve gone looking for the hope that sustained the Apostle Paul as he endured trial after trial in his ministry. My logic here is simple: If Paul suffered greatly and found joy, those of us who suffer lightly…
Yesterday I mentioned that I had gone looking for the source of the joy that seemed to mark the ministry of the Apostle Paul. Here is a man who suffered greatly in all the years he ministered for the Lord and yet a man who was full of joy, or at least a man who…