Gospel-centeredness is all the rage today. We want the gospel at the center of our lives, our churches, our families. I love it. Gospel-centeredness is simply a new phrase that expresses the age-old practice of recounting the gospel and living all of life in light of what Christ has done. The fact is that the…
A few days ago I shared John Bunyan’s wisdom on why some who profess faith in Christ eventually backslide. Today I want to follow him a little bit farther. Having covered the why, I’ve now drawn from Pilgrim’s Progress instruction on the how. In each case I’ve given my short summary followed by Bunyan’s own…
This is my once-monthly post on the Puritan John Owen. In this series of posts I am sharing some of what John Owen says about putting sin to death, or what he calls mortification. I have been going through his book Overcoming Sin and Temptation and trying to distill each chapter to its essence—to a…
Yesterday I began to write about what I called The Lost Sin of Envy. I gave a short history of Envy and then shared some of what the Bible says about him. Today I want to show how he behaves and how you can expect him to work himself out in your life. Envy Competes…
Here is some wisdom from Richard Sibbes–the kind of wisdom that, if we could just take it to heart, all the way to heart, it would make every difference in our lives. If we would make it evident that our conversion is sound we must loathe and hate sin from the heart; now a man…
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…
Once again, don’t run away from this blog post just because it has a Puritan flavor to it. I mentioned last month that I’ve been running through John Owen’s Overcoming Sin and Temptation and trying to distill each chapter to its essence–to a few choice quotes that capture the flavor of what Owen is trying…
I had an unusual and unexpected experience on Sunday–one that struck me as rather significant. I have been doing quite a bit of preaching at Grace Fellowship Church and elsewhere and knew that Sunday marked the last time I would have to prepare a fresh sermon until the end of the calendar year. Somehow this…
Once again, don’t run away from this blog post just because it’s got a bit of a Puritan flavor to it. I mentioned last week that I’ve been running through John Owen’s Overcoming Sin and Temptation and trying to distill each chapter to its essence–to a few choice quotes that capture the flavor of what…
Today we continue our project of reading through John Stott’s classic work The Cross of Christ. We’ve now moved onto Part III which discusses “The Achievement of the Cross.” Here Stott begins to move from the event itself to the consequences, “from what happened on the cross to what was achieved by it.” The Bible…
This morning brings us to our next reading in John Stott’s classic work The Cross of Christ. We are now in chapter 5 which is titled “Satisfaction for Sin.” In this chapter Stott argues that the cross was necessary because God “must ‘satisfy himself’ in the way of salvation he devises; he cannot save us…
Read an outside view on Calvinists or Calvinism, and you are sure to read something about God’s wrath. Every time. The God of Calvinism is a wrathful, vengeful God, boiling over in anger against any part of creation that has turned against him. He is no God of love, this. Sure, he may have some…
Canada’s Bank of Nova Scotia has to be one of the few banks in the world that allows you to order gold bullion online. Visit their web site, punch in your order along with your credit card information, and a couple days later FedEx will deliver your gold to the door, all sealed up in…
We are all looking for the perfect Christmas gift for our loved ones, right? Well let me suggest a unique one that I’m sure they’ll love. Why don’t you consider giving them a gift subscription to Friends of the Blog? Check out this list of great items they would receive with that gift subscription: How…
We are all looking for the perfect Christmas gift for our loved ones, right? Well let me suggest a unique one that I’m sure they’ll love. Why don’t you consider giving them a gift subscription to Friends of the Blog? Check out this list of great items they would receive with that gift subscription: How…
As anyone knows who has studied the life of Jonathan Edwards, he dedicated a large portion of his ministry to thinking, writing and teaching about the freedom of the will. And, of course, he eventually published a classic work dealing with the subject. In writing the book he thought back to the days when revival…
Late this afternoon we heard from Thabiti Anyabwile on “Cosmic Treason: Sin & the Holiness of God.” He began by joking that his name is Swahili and roughly translated means “suffering for Jesus in the Cayman Islands.” And then he got down to business. He read Numbers 25 and divided his exposition of this chapter…
As I mentioned last week, I’ve decided to read John Stott’s The Cross of Christ before Easter this year. I’ve been reading it a bit slower than I might like, but have been enjoying it immensely. To this point the chapter entitled “The Problem of Forgiveness” has been my favorite. This is a quote that…
This morning we continue with our fourteen week journey through John Owen’s classic Overcoming Sin and Temptation. If you’d like to know more about this reading project, you can read about it right here: Reading Classics Together. We’re into the real heart of the book now and are looking at specific instructions on how to…
After an unplanned holiday hiatus, we continue today with reading through John Owen’s Overcoming Sin and Temptation. I should have known that I’d be unable to carve time out of my busy holiday schedule to give the book the time it deserves. Lesson learned. But we continue today with the seventh chapter. If you’d like…