The grace of the Lord Jesus be with you.
Coming up today:
- Canada’s new hate bill
- Project Hail Mary and positive masculinity
- Friend after friend departs
- and more …
(Yesterday on the blog: It’s a Risk To Be in Front of a Room)
Sales & Deals
Today’s Kindle deals include a pair of excellent books by Ian Vaillancourt. One of them, Unfolding Redemption, was released only last week, yet it is already heavily discounted. You’ll find lots of other great deals besides these.
Recommended Reading
Canada’s New Hate Bill & the Future of Religious Liberty. I have had several people, even here in Zambia, express concern for religious liberty in Canada. This article by the Institute for Faith & Culture does a good job of summarizing the latest challenge and then says, “This development in Canada, therefore, offers a warning that should not be ignored. It is a reminder that religious liberty is not self-sustaining. It must be understood, articulated, and defended. If it is reduced to private belief or recast as a cover for harm, it will not long survive.”
On Judging Books. Matt Reynolds grapples with some of the challenges of reviewing books. “In many cases, however, a book’s reputational journey owes less to literary lions and media gatekeepers than to regular Joes, with their internet connections and social media platforms. As with restaurants, movies, neighborhood handymen, and nearly every consumer item under the sun, so with books. These days, everyone’s a critic. Websites like Goodreads (like its plucky little upstart owner, Amazon) enable users to post ratings and comments, which can influence sales figures and public perceptions in unpredictable ways.”
How Should We Think About The Liberal Trad? Steven Wedgeworth writes about the rise of what he calls the “Liberal Trad.” “The Liberal Trad fully accepts political liberalism, to include late liberal norms that are often described as ‘progressive.’ The Liberal Trad normally supports the LGBTQ+ movements and abortion rights. But these Liberal Trads also identify as Christians, even of the churchly kind. They typically do not affirm biblical inerrancy, and they usually do support women’s ordination to every ecclesiastical office. But the Liberal Trad also affirms and promotes the Nicene Creed and other aspects of historic doctrinal orthodoxy.”
How “Project Hail Mary” Answers the Call for Positive Masculinity. I haven’t seen Project Hail Mary, so I cannot comment on it personally. But I was intrigued by Joseph Holmes’ thoughts on it. “The film is … a textbook case in positive masculinity. While many Hollywood films make it seem like you have to choose between Barbie’s toxic ‘Dictator Ken’ or ‘Doormat Ken’, Project Hail Mary’s male heroes are distinctly positive while distinctly masculine. Understanding why can help us give men a viable vision for their manhood today.”
The Danger of Interpreting God’s Word With Our Feelings. I think we are all familiar with the tendency to interpret God’s Word according to our feelings, and that’s what Krista writes about here. “This is the power of God’s Word: it supersedes our feelings. It knows our feelings cannot be trusted all the time and it gives us guidance in a myriad of circumstances when our feelings only serve to confuse us at best or deceive us at worst.”
On Networking and Platforming — and Generosity. I just love this article from Joy Allmond. “Writers and speakers and teachers and preachers and leaders accumulate two things over time that are tempting to treat as personal assets: relationships and reach. Both are gifts. Neither belongs to us the way we think it does. And the ones who understand that are the ones who end up with the most influence — because they gave it away.”
Imbila
I have enjoyed my time at Imbila Writer’s Conference ’26, held in Kitwe, Zambia. It has been a lot of what you see in this photo: speaking to an eager audience of writers and potential writers and helping them gain the knowledge and skills they can use to find their place in the world of publishing. (Imbila, by the way, is Bemba for “good” and helps form the local word for “good news.”)
Poem
I’d say that James Montgomery (1771-1854) is one of history’s finest Christian poets. This work, “Friend after Friend Departs,” has been a blessing to me lately.
Friend after friend departs;
Who hath not lost a friend?
There is no union here of hearts,
That finds not here an end:
Were this frail world our only rest,
Living or dying, none were blest.Beyond the flight of time,
Beyond this vale of death,
There surely is some blessèd clime
Where life is not a breath,
Nor life’s affections transient fire,
Whose sparks fly upward and expire.There is a world above,
Where parting is unknown,
A whole eternity of love,
Formed for the good alone;
And faith beholds the dying here
Translated to that happier sphere.Thus star by star declines,
Till all are passed away,
As morning high and higher shines
To pure and perfect day;
Nor sink those stars in empty night,
But hide themselves in Heaven’s own light.
Flashback
The Most Pleasant Show on Television. All Creatures has reminded me just how pleasant and unprovocative television can be. It has reminded me of an earlier era in entertainment when much (though certainly not all) of what was available was actually watchable for those who don’t wish to see what shouldn’t be seen and amused by what shouldn’t be amusing.
A small leak will sink a great ship. A small spark will kindle a great fire. A little allowed sin will ruin an immortal soul.
—J.C. Ryle
