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A La Carte (January 16)

thursday

Today’s Kindle deals include a handful of books, including one good one by R.C. Sproul.

(Yesterday on the blog: Get To Know Onthatile Children’s Ministries)

Max Lucado’s Endorsement of Jen Hatmaker: What it Means and Why it Matters

This is important: “It can be tempting to view any display of disunity as divisive. But we would do good to remember that the Bible places the blame for divisions on the ones bringing in the false doctrine, not on those who call it out.”

How To Listen to Kindle Books

Obviously you know how to read Kindle books, but do you know how to listen to them? Here’s a brief explanation.

This Is Your Body Today

“What does it mean to bear on our bodies the marks of living in this world, to experience all that life and God will give and throw at us, and to not blame the sleeplessness or stretch marks on being a mother—or to find pride in them either because they birthed live children? To not blame the creaks and groans on laziness or lack or time. To not see ourselves as a victim of some perverse injustice, but to simply say to the body that holds us today and to the God who made it: ‘Thank you’ and also ‘This hurts’?”

It’s What We Do

I appreciate Peter’s words of wisdom for young pastors. “Sunday-by Sunday as you teach or preach (and counsel, and converse, and pray, and lead), you plant and water, plant and water. You sow the seed of God’s word in the lives of people, planting precious truths in their hearts, and you water by reviewing those truths and teaching supporting truths.”

How Slack Ruined Work

While I appreciate much of what Slack offers, I also think it has not lived up to many of its promises. Still, this may be over-stating it a little: “Technology advances usually supplant what has come before but Slack hasn’t, it’s just doubled the pain.”

Another Kind of Diversity to Consider

Don’t get too excited or too dismayed by another use of “diversity.” I think Brad Hambrick makes a valid point here. “There is a tendency in both business and church life to fill decision making tables with powerful people who ‘get things done.’ The result can be that even with ethnic and gender diversity, there can still be a nearly exclusive extroverted decision-making team. This will come with all the strengths and weaknesses that accompany extroversion.” Diversity of personality matters.

The Shipwreck That Gave Birth to South Africa

Here is a very brief history of South Africa, and the key role a shipwreck played in its founding—a shipwreck that may soon be found.

Flashback: Aging Gracefully

Every day, we are all building the house we will live in when old age comes. Some of us are building a beautiful palace. Some are building a dark prison. What are you building?

Sanctification is the process of learning increasing dependence, not autonomy.

—Jen Wilkin

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    What God Wants You To Forget

    We are never far from reminding God of our credentials, of providing him with a curriculum vitae that lays out all we are, all we have been through, and all we have accomplished for his sake. We are never far from making the subtle turn from grace to merit, from what is freely given to…

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    A La Carte (March 27)

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    Does God Care How You Cook Your Goat?

    It is one of those biblical commands that has always perplexed me. If it appeared just one time in Scripture I might be tempted to pass it by. But it appears no less than three times, in Exodus 23:19, Exodus 34:26, and Deuteronomy 14:21. The repetition tells me that God is quite concerned that his…