Grace and peace to you as you serve and honor the Lord this weekend.
My gratitude goes to Boyce College for sponsoring the blog this week so they can invite you to their upcoming Virtual Preview Day.
Today’s Kindle deals include some classics along with a couple of newer works.
(Yesterday on the blog: To My Son on His Twenty-First Birthday)
Died: Larry Crabb, Christian Counselor Who Kept Exploring
Christianity Today remembers Larry Crabb who died a few days ago. “Crabb was a clinical psychologist who turned to biblical counseling and then to spiritual direction. He authored more than 25 books in the process, writing the popular textbook Effective Biblical Counseling and then more than a dozen titles, including Inside Out, Shattered Dreams, Pressure’s Off, and SoulTalk, teaching people to see their own brokenness as a longing for God and new creation.”
Why Did Jesus Choose Judas?
John Piper answers this question which you may have asked at one time or another. “I have been studying through the book of John lately, and I began to wonder why Jesus chose Judas to be one of his disciples in the first place. And what does Jesus have to teach us by choosing someone to be his disciple, knowing full well he would betray him? Are there any takeaways for us in this?”
Why Privacy Matters
There are lots of concerns these days related to privacy and this article considers some of them from a Christian perspective. “A right to privacy is not derived from the moral autonomy of the individual but from the dignity of all people with the understanding that each life is precious and valued by God himself who created us as individuals in his image. One of the functions of privacy in this world is a way to care for the vulnerable among us and uphold their dignity as image bearers in a technologically rich society.”
Engaging Our Emotions, Engaging With God
“If you are surprised to hear that God actually wants you to draw near to him when you feel like you are an emotional mess, remember this: the Bible views emotions as fundamentally good. How do I know this? Because we are image bearers of God and he has emotions. His joy, hate, wrath, compassion, jealousy and love are the model for ours.”
Whatever Happened to “Surrendering to Ministry”?
The phrase “surrendering to ministry” was one I never heard until I found myself in American Baptist contexts. “A generation ago, ‘surrendering to ministryl was common parlance in Baptist churches. In fact, hardly an invitation was extended in my home church that did not include a call to surrender to ministry, immediately after an appeal to follow Christ, be baptized, or join the church.”
Regeneration
And maybe there’s another phrase we’ve dropped recently: “We’ve dropped being born again from our vocabulary as evangelicals as it smacks of being American from the 1950s and yet the doctrine of regeneration couldn’t be more vital. If you’ve not been born again/regenerated you cannot enter the kingdom of God (John 3:3,5 which fulfils Ezekiel 36:25,26). If you don’t understand regeneration you will misunderstand the whole of the gospel.”
Flashback: Spare the Rod, Spoil the Parent
A child who does not respect the authority of his parents will never respect the authority of his Creator. If we fail to discipline our children to obey us, we fail to discipline them to submit to God.
We never love one another so much; we are never so gentle toward one another, so thoughtful, so unselfish, as when a common grief has touched us all.
—J.R. Miller
