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A La Carte (November 23)

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The Bible App Deep Dive

I enjoyed this extensive review and comparison of various Bible apps. It’s fun to see how far apps have come over the past few years.

Holiday at the Dictator’s Guesthouse

If you’re in the mood for a long read, you’ll enjoy reading about one eccentric who decided to travel to North Korea in order to leave a Bible behind. It didn’t go very well.

Don’t Forget These Heroes of Paris

The terrible events in Paris did not unfold without some heroics. “At center stage in this show of courage and compassion were men and women who risked their lives to save others.”

Questions Through the Decades

Alan Wilson shares a series of questions which characterise each decade of life.

This Day in 101. According to tradition, Clement of Rome, “the first apostolic father,” died 1,914 years ago today. *

Syria’s Lost Children

Even while people consider how to help Syrian refugees, it is important that we do not lose sight of who many of them actually are. “Photojournalist Magnus Wennman traveled around Europe and the Middle East, capturing these children of war as they tried to find some rest in a frightening, uncertain world.”

Forgetting to Preach the Gospel

The new emphasis on gospel-centered preaching is a good thing. “As with any philosophy, it is often easier to believe in theory than it is to implement in practice. In this blog we will look at three common ways that those committed to gospel-centered preaching unintentionally forget to preach the gospel.”

Why Fractals Are So Beautiful

“You don’t have to look hard to notice aspects of nature that clearly don’t fit the Euclidean framework. Rivers, mountains, coastlines, lightning, our circulatory system : Where’s the symmetry and structure? Where’s the order? The answer, as mathematicians are discovering more and more often, involves fractals: geometric figures that occur in nature, even in seemingly chaotic systems.”

Keller

When you realize that the antidote to being bad is not just being good, you are on the brink of understanding the Gospel.

—Tim Keller

  • The Phrase that Altered My Thinking Forever

    This week the blog is sponsored by P&R Publishing and is written by Ralph Cunnington. Years ago, I stumbled repeatedly on an ancient phrase that altered my thinking forever.  Distinct yet inseparable. The first time I encountered this phrase was while studying the Council of Chalcedon’s description of the two natures of Christ. Soon after,…

  • Always Look for the Light

    Always Look for the Light

    For many years there was a little potted plant on our kitchen window sill, though I’ve long since forgotten the variety. Year after year that plant would put out a shoot and from the shoot would emerge a single flower. And I observed that no matter how I turned the pot, the flower would respond.…

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    A La Carte (March 18)

    A La Carte: God is good and does good—even in our pain / Dear bride and groom / Sin won’t comfort you / Worthy of the gospel / From self-sufficiency to trusting God’s people / The gods fight for our devotion / and more.

  • Confidence

    God Takes Us Into His Confidence

    Here is another Sunday devotional—a brief thought to orient your heart toward the Lord. God takes the initiative in establishing relationship by reaching out to helpless humanity. He reveals himself to the creatures he has made. But what does it mean for him to provide such revelation of himself? John Calvin began his Institutes by…

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    Weekend A La Carte (March 16)

    A La Carte: I believe in the death of Julius Caesar and the resurrection of Jesus Christ / Reasons students and pastors shouldn’t use ChatGPT / A 1.3 gigpixel photo of a supernova / What two raw vegans taught me about sharing Jesus / If we realize we’re undeserving, suddenly the world comes alive /…

  • Ask Pastor John

    Ask Pastor John

    I admit it: I felt a little skeptical about Ask Pastor John. To be fair, I feel skeptical about most books that begin in one medium before making the leap to another. Books based on sermons, for example, can often be pretty disappointing—a powerful sermon at a conference can make a bland chapter in a…