Parents, do not provoke your children to anger lest they become discouraged, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.” This single sentence combines the New Testament’s two most prominent passages on parenting and, as I said yesterday (see Fathers (and Mothers), Do Not Provoke Your Children!), offers a significant warning…
You can tell a lot about a person by learning what brings him pleasure. Pleasure is good. God has wired us to pursue pleasure. The question is: Will we seek the truest and highest pleasures, or will we settle for lesser ones? Will we, in the oft-quoted words of C.S. Lewis, accept the holiday by…
As you may know, I decided to read through both of the Finding God in The Shack books released this month (two books, two authors, one title). Last week I reviewed the first of these (see: Finding God in the Shack (1)) and in a day or two I will review the second. But first,…
There has been a good bit of talk in the blogosphere over the past couple of weeks about the election of a new President of the Southern Baptist Convention. As you no-doubt know, there are many who have been seeking to build bridges between the Calvinist and Arminian factions within the Convention. Monday’s “debate” between…
Several months ago I wrote an article where I outlined the difference between evangelism and outreach. These are terms that many people treat as being synonymous, yet they are distinct and need to be treated as such. This morning I was thinking about the idea of “successful evangelism.” What makes one evangelistic effort successful and…
Every Christian should agree on the necessity of reaching out to the world with the Good News of Jesus Christ. Through history some Christians and some groups of Christians have placed more emphasis on this than others, but nearly all have agreed on its importance. In the English language we have two terms that are…