Sometimes a book’s title is clever, or poetic, or deliberately opaque. Sometimes, though, the title just lays it right out in the open. This is the case with Gavin Ortlund’s Finding the Right Hills to Die On. The subtitle clarifies even further: “The Case for Theological Triage.” This is a book, then, about assessing different…
If we wanted to read a book about what Jesus did, we would have many options available to us. But if we wanted to read a book about who Jesus is, well, the options would be far fewer. Obviously the two studies are closely connected, for what Jesus did is inexorably tied to who he…
Over the past few years I’ve had many opportunities to speak on the subject of technology—a natural consequence of having written a book called The Next Story: Faith, Friends, Family, and the Digital World. I almost invariably end my speeches with a time of Q&A and one question I can always count on being asked…
It’s not an easy thing to tell the history of a nation. And, in fact, there are many different ways to do so. At least when it comes to the history of Western nations, the past few years seem to have marked a great shift in this regard. When I was young, the history of…
The Bible records many great prayers. Some of the most prominent come in the form of psalms and, of all these, David’s heartbroken, soul-sick prayer of Psalm 51 may be the most haunting. In a desperate bid to cover up a grievous sin, David has committed yet another grievous sin. He has been exposed as…
A wise friend once told me, “No one should write a book about marriage until they’ve been married for twenty years.” Then he reached his twentieth anniversary and amended his rule: “No one should write a book about marriage until they’ve been married for thirty years.” The point is, none of us ever master marriage,…
Satan is many things. But one fact the Bible makes perfectly clear is that he is a liar. Already by the third chapter of the Bible he has been deceitful (taking a physical form that is not his), he has been deceptive (getting people to question whether God is as good as they had thought),…
I once met a prominent Christian—a Reformed Baptist theologian, even—who admitted something to me that sounded almost scandalous: He doesn’t care for The Pilgrim’s Progress. He read it as a student, he re-read it as an adult, and it just didn’t do much for him. And with that in view, here’s a confession of my…
A book about suffering is usually born from adversity in the life of the author, and that’s exactly the case with Tessa Thompson’s Laughing at the Days to Come: Facing Present Trials and Future Uncertainties with Gospel Hope. When she was in her mid-teens, she was diagnosed with Neurofibromatosis Type 2 (NF2) and began to…
There’s no doubt that the pastor’s calling is unique. It comes with unique blessings and unique challenges. Some of the greatest challenges are related to both preaching and to being a preacher—preaching as the actual task of preparing and delivering a sermon week by week, and being a preacher as the life and character that…
You do meet some interesting people in the Christian world, whether such meetings happen through real-life interactions or whether they happen through books and blogs. When it comes to Mez McConnell, I’ve met him in all of those ways—I have read his books, I have read many of the articles he has written, I have…
Few things concern parents more than the thought that a predator may have set his sights on their children. Few fears terrify parents more than that they may fail to protect their children from those who would seek to do them harm. Few things break a parent’s heart like learning that their child has been…
Rachael Denhollander’s What Is a Girl Worth? is a hard book to read. But it’s also an important book to read. While it tells of the horrendous crimes perpetrated by just one man, it warns that many similar crimes have been and are being perpetrated by a great many other predators. While it focuses largely…
Over the past couple of years I’ve heard more and more women speaking of how the Risen Motherhood podcast or website (founded by Emily Jensen and Laura Wifler) has been a blessing to them. And these aren’t just women I encounter “out there” in the Christian world but women I know “right here” in my…
If you pay attention to Christian publishing, you’ll observe that certain themes come and go, rise and fall. One author will write a book on a subject and that may ignite interest so that several others follow up to challenge that person’s view, to affirm it, or to pursue it from a different angle. A…
Have you ever read an “if this is true…” book? An “if this is true…” book is one that challenges you so deeply that you realize that if what it’s saying is true, then you’ve got to make some major changes to your life. R.C. Sproul’s The Holiness of God is one of those books—many…
It is beyond dispute that the prosperity gospel has swept over the world to such a degree that a significant portion of those who call themselves Christians—whether at home or abroad—hold to a version of Christianity that bears little resemblance to “the faith once for all delivered to the saints.” It is beyond dispute that…
It can’t be easy to be a teen girl. Though I suppose there has probably never been a context in which coming of age was free from all challenges, there’s no doubt that the twenty-first century offers some new and unique ones. And if it can’t be easy to be a teen girl, it can’t…
While the gospel remains fixed and unchanging, every generation is different from the one before. While God’s Word is always true and powerful, each generation has its own doubts and questions. This means that each generation needs to be taught about God and his Word in a unique way. Where gen X might have responded…
It’s sometimes amazing to consider how quickly societal mores change, how quickly an idea can go from unthinkable to acceptable, from having great social stigma attached to its acceptance to having even greater social stigma attached to its rejection. There may be no better example of this than transgenderism. Less than a generation ago, few…