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A La Carte (July 6)

tuesday

May the God of love and peace be with you today.

Reminder: I have a book coming out in September titled Knowing and Enjoying God. There is currently a pre-order special where the first 250 to submit proof of purchase will receive some bonus physical prints.

Disciple Making Movements

This analysis of disciple making movements, written from a Reformed Presbyterian perspective, is very illuminating and very helpful. “The numbers, if they are to be believed, are staggering. Millions of Christian converts. Thousands of churches. And all this in a few years, with relatively little direct engagement. It is no wonder that the recent missionary strategy known as ‘Disciple-Making Movements’ (DMM) has become increasingly prevalent in Western missionary sending agencies.”

How to Tame Your Tongue

“Taming is a process by which a wild beast is subdued into adapting and submitting to human control. Which beast is the hardest to tame? Zebras? Sharks? House cats?” The Bible points us in a different direction…

Theistic Evolution and the Doctrine of Death

This long article from Creation.com looks at theistic evolution and its teaching that there must have been death before man’s fall into sin. “Belief in evolution can radically alter one’s concept of death. The whole creation/evolution debate revolves around the question of how God created. Was it by speaking things into existence ex nihilo, ‘out of nothing’ (see Hebrews 11:3)? Did He specially create unique kinds of living organisms upon the earth inside a single week? Or did God use evolution, spreading out this creative activity over hundreds of millions of years? If the latter, inevitably struggle, disease, violence and death would have been involved at every step along the way.”

John Hus’s Company of Women

“John Hus, the Bohemian Reformer who was condemned as heretic at the Council of Constance, was supported by a large number of women. This was, in some ways, unusual.” Simonetta Carr explains.

What Does It Mean that Jesus Is Prophet, Priest, and King?

“Theologians down the centuries have often spoken of Jesus’s threefold office. Jesus has one office, that of Messiah or Christ. He is the anointed one, the one mediator between God and man, the Savior. But this office has three aspects to it: those of prophet, priest, and king.”

One Surprising Reason for Pain

John Piper: “Why do we have a world like this? Why so much pain? Why so much conflict? Why so much suffering? Why so much gas? It is a horrible place. It is a conveyor belt of corpses. Millions of people right now are weeping their eyes out over the sorrows in their lives, as we speak. Why such a world?”

On Taking Heart

This is a hard and haunting update from medical missionaries in Uganda.

Flashback: Controversy or Complacency

Controversy and complacency—both are alive in the church today. Sadly, both are alive in me as well.

It is not the absence of sin but the grieving over it which distinguishes the child of God from empty professors.

—A.W. Pink

  • A Batch of New Books for Kids

    A Batch of New Books for Kids (and Teens)

    Every month I put together a roundup of new and notable books for grownup readers. But I also receive a lot of books for kids and like to put together the occasional roundup of these books as well. So today I bring you a whole big batch of new books for kids of all ages…

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    A La Carte (March 28)

    A La Carte: The case against the abortion pill / What I’ve learned about grieving with hope / Heartbreaking deception: teen girls, social media, and body image / Could podcasts save the church from stupidity? / Count it all joy / and more.

  • What God Wants You To Forget

    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)

    A La Carte: New music / Millennials and GenZ / Scotland’s new hate crime law / Cate Blanchett, Easter is for you / Why the Reformed pray for revival / What truly happened to Jesus on the cross? / and more.

  • New and Notable Books

    New and Notable Christian Books for March 2024

    As you know, I like to do my best to sort through the new Christian books that are released each month to see what stands out as being not only new, but also particularly notable. I received quite a number of new titles in March and narrowed the list down to the ones below. I…

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    A La Carte (March 26)

    A La Carte: God delivers from the suffering he ordains / The beautiful partnership of family and church / The end of religious liberty / On whales, menopause, and thanks to God / Ordinary women, extravagant gifts / and more.