I think I may be leaving one phase of fatherhood behind even while I enter into another. My youngest child is just about to turn eight, which means that we are not only past the baby and toddler stages, but even nearing the end of the little kid phase. Meanwhile my oldest child has turned…
Over the weekend I came across a few different articles on a common theme: grumpiness. These were articles meant to offer guidance in those times—those inevitable times—when you’re in a bad mood and just can’t break out. While the articles had some helpful advice, they had this in common: They dealt with symptoms rather than…
The law of entropy seems to apply to every area of life in this broken world. Without constant effort to the contrary, houses get dirty, gardens get overgrown, cars get rusty, habits get sloppy, children get unruly. If you leave it alone, whatever it is, it gets slower, not faster; sloppier, not neater; worse, not…
I’m so busy. You’re so busy. We’re all so busy. We’re so busy that we can’t possibly fit one more thing into our schedules, or one more relationship into our lives. That’s life in North America, or perhaps just life in the twenty-first century. In an article in the New York Times, Tim Kreider says…
Criticism is inevitable. At certain times we will all face another person’s analysis or rebuke of our behavior. The best kind of criticism comes from friends, from those who know us and love us best. “Better is open rebuke than hidden love. Faithful are the wounds of a friend; profuse are the kisses of an…
I grew up in a Christian tradition that emphasized the continuity between the Old Testament and the New. These Christians held, among other things, that the Old Testament Sabbath commands—given to observe the fourth commandment—carry into the New Testament Lord’s Day. This meant that the whole day was consecrated to the Lord. A whole twenty-four…
Family is under attack. As Christians we are accustomed to hearing about divorce and pornography and gay marriage and so many other moral issues. Have you ever considered how many of these moral issues relate directly to family? If you look, you will see that the very notion of family—family as the Bible describes it—is…
Sometimes we all feel like frauds. At times we feel like everyone else is experiencing something so wonderful while we are just putting on a show. Their relationships are so deep, their friendships are so real, their faith is so strong, their worship is so heartfelt, their marriage is so satisfying. But our relationships are…
When I was a child my family owned a cottage—a beautiful cottage where I spent every summer of my childhood. On those long, warm, summer evenings, we would sometimes have friends and neighbors from up and down the road converge on our property for giant games of capture the flag. Those were grand nights—the kind…
The earliest messages are often the longest-lasting messages. Charles Spurgeon said that the voices of childhood echo throughout life so that “The first learned is generally the last forgotten.” This can be a tremendous blessing when truth is taught early and when it sinks in deep. It is for this reason that Christians have valued…
I once had a job I hated. Day after day I sat in a windowless basement office surrounded by hot, noisy computers. Day after day nothing happened. I had no major projects to inspire me, no big goals to work toward, no clear mission to fulfill. It was a bland and boring existence down there,…
My children are growing up fast and, between you and me, they’re growing up a little bit faster than I had expected. My son is thirteen now, just a half school year away from being in high school. I sometimes find myself remembering when I was thirteen, and the kinds of things I awakened to…
Every pastor, and I suppose every Christian as well, has a kind of theological toolbox, a means of dealing with the questions and concerns that appear throughout life. I was thinking recently about the tools I use most often and narrowed it down to two. There are two grids I’ve found especially helpful, and ones…
Marriage is under attack. Marriage has always been under attack. The world, the flesh and the devil are all adamantly opposed to marriage, and especially to marriages that are distinctly Christian. Marriage, after all, is given by God to strengthen his people and to glorify himself; little wonder, then, that it is constantly a great…
Praying in circles is fast becoming a thing in some Evangelical churches. People have been taught to draw circles around the things they want, or even to walk in circles around the things they are sure the Lord ought to grant them. In either case, they are to pray around those things and in that…
You have heard the distinction as often as I have—the distinction between head knowledge and heart knowledge. We learn facts about God, about his character, about his Word, but it is not until those facts reach the heart that they become spiritually beneficial. They say the journey from the head to the heart is the…
I like to be strong. At least I like to appear strong. You do too, I think. Most of us value strength and look down on weakness. We honor those who have their lives together and regard with suspicion those who do not. Strength = good, weakness = bad. That is our functional formula. But…
We all have some familiarity with that deep, gnawing, pit-of-the-stomach anxiety, that stubborn worry that refuses to abate. The cause and effect may be a little different for each one of us, but we all have a time and a place and set of circumstances that causes us to be anxious. In his book Running…
Keith Green told us, “Jesus commands us to go. It should be the exception if we stay. It’s no wonder we’re moving so slow, When His church refuse to obey.” I used to think that if Green had been allotted a few more years, he probably would have walked away from his career as a…
It may be one of the most difficult imperatives in all of the Bible: “Be angry and do not sin” (Ephesians 4:26). This verse assures us there are times we ought to be angry, but with one all-important caveat: we must not sin in our anger. Any honest person will need to acknowledge the sheer…