The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with you today.
Today’s Kindle deals include several good options for pastors, younger readers, and general readers. On the general market side, you’ll find a couple of top-quality presidential biographies.
The Courage in Encouragement
Trevin Wax explains why encouragement requires courage. “What sometimes surprises me isn’t the number of people struggling but how many feel alone in their struggle, as if they’re the only ones dealing with a particular burden or disappointment. They’re not. Behind the curated images on social media and the happy families at church, the strains are there—an especially difficult adolescent, a spouse’s sudden loss of spiritual fervor, or a father’s disorientation regarding his future job prospects.”
First-Time Obedience: It’s Not Just for Kids
Bekka French asks whether we have higher expectations for our children than for ourselves when it comes to obedience. “First-time obedience is a hill we die on as parents, but it occurred to me the other day: ‘Am I practicing this with God?’ While I am quick to enforce this with my kids, I am much more lax in my own heart when it comes to the small obedience moments of my day.”
Five Practical Tips for Pastors
These five practical tips are written specifically for pastors, but I think plenty of non-pastors would like to read and apply them as well.
Held, Together
I like the way Cheryl imaginatively and poetically describes the beauty of gathering with the local church.
Christians Bear Fruit
Kristin considers the idea that a person can be a Christian but fail to bear fruit. “If you are sitting beneath live-however-you-wish-after-you-have-raised-your-hand-and-repeated-this-prayer-after-me type of preaching, run. Your soul is in danger.”
The Sing! Hymnal Daily Readings
A reader sent me this neat daily reading plan for the Getty’s Sing! Hymnal. If you’d like to make your way through it in a systematic way, this will lead you through it in a year. It’s available as a free PDF download.
Flashback: I Want Him Back (But Not The Old Me Back)
There is so much I have learned, so many ways God has drawn close to me, so many blessings I’ve received from the Lord. And all of these came through sorrow, not apart from it. In some ways my greatest gains have flowed from my greatest loss, my greatest joys from my deepest sorrow.
Two sound rules ought to be observed—one is: never to ask what you have no right to know—the other rule is never to tell other people what they have no right to know.
—Theodore Cuyler
