A La Carte (July 25)

Today’s Kindle deals include a few titles you might want to add to your collection.

A Brief History of the Altar Call

“By the mid-20th century, altar calls had become a staple of evangelical and Baptist life in America, especially in the South.” But where did that thing come from in the first place?

Progressivism’s Peak Lunacy

This is, indeed, lunacy. But I fear we’ve got a ways to go before it hits its peak. But the point Matthew Hosier makes here is an important one: Is gender everything or nothing?

How Can I Forgive Myself?

H.B. Charles answers: “The most faithful response to this question is to reject it as an illegitimate question.”

Extraordinary Octopus Takes To Land (Video)

I prefer when sea things stay in the sea and land things stay on the land. But this octopus doesn’t play by those rules.

Questions I’m Asking While Off to My White Evangelical Church

Lisa Robinson asks some urgent and important questions as she, a visible minority, heads to her white Evangelical church. “How does this all cause me to even look at those white people in my church, and white Christians in general? How can I now not be suspicious of them? Are they now not those who oppose me, who oppose blackness and the struggle that has existed for so many years?”

The Gospel is Like an Old Hymn

Jared Wilson: “A lot of the new songs–not all of them, of course, but a lot of them–head straight to how I feel about Jesus but never take me into the depths of why I ought to feel that way. We’re summoning the wind, calling down the fire, pleading for rainfall. (I begin to wonder if I’m worshiping God or reciting some kind of medieval weather report.) I’m telling God what I want, what I need (what I loooong for, ooooohh).”