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A La Carte (4/27)

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Taking a Step of Faith – Dan Phillips offers some valuable thoughts on Francis Chan’s recent announcement that he is taking a step of faith and moving on from his church.

Swapping Is the New Shopping – USA Today on the rise of swapping and bartering: “The rise of the quid pro quo possession comes courtesy of a host of reasons: budget-tightening during a persistently sour economy (swapping is mostly free, save for shipping costs or, for face-to-face fetes, a nominal entry fee); eBay, consignment-store and yard-sale fatigue (you might only get a few dollars for all the effort required); hand-me-down headaches (rifling through a garbage bag of kids’ clothes is daunting and inefficient); environmental awareness (swapping, of course, is the ultimate form of recycling) and fashion experimentation (it’s a frugal way to try out trends).” (HT:Boundless)

We Need Gospel Movements, Not Just Better Churches – Darryl Dash pens a good article on working with local churches. “We all need to learn from others. We’re used to learning from big and successful churches in other countries. It’s much more effective to learn from good churches in our own contexts. That means that I can probably learn more about effective ministry in my city from other churches in my city, and places like it. The resources I need may not be found within my own movement, but within churches that belong to other movements.”

Should We Marry If We’re Theologically Divided? – Russell Moore consistently posts real-life questions that are very good opportunities to attempt to think biblically.


  • When God Plants an Acorn

    When God Plants an Acorn, He Means an Oak

    We stood together on the crest of a hill, a gentle breeze rustling the meadow around our feet. The fields ran gently downward until they met a creek that gurgled happily in its course. A few years prior, an acorn had somehow made its way to the highest point of this hill, carelessly dropped there…

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    A La Carte (April 28)

    A La Carte: Protestantism’s Catholic converts / How healthy is your pursuit of health? / God’s special calling on your life / Considering a Christian university? / Testing the teachings of Catholicism / Kindle deals / and more.

  • New and Notable

    New and Notable Christian Books for April 2025

    It is surprisingly difficult to find a list of Christian books that have been released in any given month—especially if you want that list to be filtered by books released through particular publishers. That’s one of the reasons why I close each month by coming up with my list of New and Notable books. I…

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    Weekend A La Carte (April 26)

    A La Carte: Every pinch of pain has purpose / China closed Christian bookstores / Watch for the thing after the thing / For everything there is a time / Showers of blessing / What Pope Francis can teach us about preaching / and more.

  • What Makes You Beautiful

    What Makes You Beautiful

    I have often thought of a conversation that took place when my girls were little. Abby was perhaps 5 or 6 at the time and Michaela just working her way through the “terrible twos” (which for our kids always happened when they were three or four). A stranger saw me interacting with them one day…