Good morning. Grace and peace to you.
Sales & Deals
Today’s Kindle deals include some especially good choices like A Heart Aflame for God, A Meal with Jesus, The Compelling Community, and A Place to Belong. If you haven’t yet read A Heart Aflame for God, it’s an especially good read.
Recommended Reading
Literal or Symbolic? Reading Revelation Responsibly. Benjamin L. Gladd discusses whether to read Revelation literally or symbolically. “Without a doubt, Revelation is one of the most difficult Bible books to understand. It has baffled ancient and modern commentators alike. Yet Revelation continues to capture the church’s imagination. The church remains divided over how to interpret the Apocalypse. There are two main approaches for reading the book: the futurist perspective and the recapitulation perspective.”
Family Prayer Is Inconvenient and Worth It. Family prayer is inconvenient, says Heather Barnes, but she insists it’s worth it. “You could call it a small prayer meeting before dinner. You could call it a daily grind to build prayer muscles in three daughters. You could call it the discipleship habit my parents started and didn’t stop. I call it one of the top ways they shaped my genuine faith in Jesus. As a kid, it felt like Acts 2:42 unfolding at the dinner table: ‘They devoted themselves to . . . the breaking of bread and the prayers.’”
Shepherd’s Notes Commentary Set Understand the Bible like never before, book by book. Shepherd’s Notes commentaries include helpful insights and study tools for every book of the Bible in a concise and easy-to-understand format. Written with church members and those called to ministry in mind, this commentary series is an ideal resource for anyone who wants to teach the Bible to others. (Sponsored)
What to Do When Your Spiritual Hero Falls. “Nobody is perfect. I think we all realize that. Every spiritual leader sins. But not all sins are the same. Being angry with my wife is not as bad as cheating on my wife. Both are sins, but they are not equally serious. Hopefully we realize that if we get close to any of our spiritual heroes, we will begin to see cracks and flaws. But what happens when spiritual leaders fail in big ways, ways that ruin lives and bring dishonor to the name of Christ? What do you do when someone you look up to falls?” Ben Hicks offers counsel on what to do when a hero falls.
Overconfidence in Our Own Abilities. This somehow doesn’t surprise me, as I think most middle-aged men believe that, if given the chance, they could be the difference-maker in almost any sport. “The Times carried a story yesterday asserting that four in ten men think they could train their way to the 2028 Olympics if they started training today. They report: The survey of 2,000 adults found that 38 per cent of men thought they could qualify for the Games if they received professional coaching and a strict training regime.”
What to Do When You Catastrophize. Alan Noble writes about a common experience. “Things fall apart. Your life falls apart—potentially. The worst thing possible might happen. It’s possible. It’s technically possible. And that’s all you can think about. It pounds in your head. Your thoughts race. You try to calculate every possibility, every outcome, every bad outcome, to identify the danger so you can protect yourself and those you love. You prepare for the worst despite lack of evidence that the worst is going to happen because if it did happen then it would be too much to bear. In short, you catastrophize.”
The Joy of Baseball. I enjoyed Daniel Darling’s celebration of the great sport of baseball. “Baseball is a funny sport. If your team is not good—and I have a lot of experience with this—the season can lag. But if your team is good and as you head toward October, it’s exhilarating. I’m a huge football fan. I love Saturdays and Sundays in the fall. For non-stop action and drama, you cannot beat football. Baseball is different. It’s a game of nuance and precision and artistry.”
Reader Recommendations
Once a week, I like to ask what you recommend. What books, products, videos, sites, or experiences do you recommend to others who read this blog/newsletter? Let me know, and I’ll share a collection on Saturday. (If you’re reading this via email, you’ll need to visit my site to fill out the form. Go here to read last week’s recommendations.)
Flashback
When Pastors Need To Be Extra Cautious. This pastor discerned that one of the challenges of being a pastor—and particularly one who is paid to minister on a full-time basis—is to continue to have a realistic assessment of how the world works “out there.”
God will not send trial without the intention of blessing; therefore, where the trial is great, we may be sure that the blessing intended is great also.
—P.B. Power
