Some time ago I read an article (which, alas, I can no longer find) that described a time that a crew from the BBC went in search of the Loch Ness Monster. I thought of this yesterday while watching the movie The Water Horse with the kids. The corporation hired a team of experts to sweep Loch Ness from end to end, back and forth for several days using some of the world’s most sophisticated sonar equipment. After a complete, …

As I read my way through the works of David McCullough, I have come to Brave Companions, a book that offers “Portraits in History”—brief glimpses of people and incidents that helped make America what she is today. One of the chapters deals with “The American Adventure of Louis Agassiz.” Agassiz was a French zoologist and geologist who settled in the United States in the mid nineteenth century. He began a distinguished career as a professor at Harvard. He revolutionized the …

We, as human beings, love underdog stories. Yesterday I watched a couple of episodes of Abraham and Mary Lincoln: A House Divided, a six-part series that aired as part of the “American Experience” program. As with any bio of Lincoln, it contrasts his early years with those of his wife. Where Mary Todd was raised in a huge home filled with servants and slaves, Abraham Lincoln was raised in a one-room cabin far from civilization; where Mary was given many …

The Westminister Shorter Catechism asks the question, “What is the chief end of man?” Many of us know the answer. “Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever.” While this is not a phrase drawn directly from Scripture, the wisdom behind it surely is. The Bible tells us with great clarity that man was created primarily to bring glory to God. Thus the chief end, the overwhelming purpose, of Christians and of the church is to …

A few years ago I went to Suffering and the Sovereignty of God, a Desiring God National Conference, and subsequently read the book drawn from those conference messages. I can’t deny that the speech given by Joni Eareckson Tada was not my favorite, at least in the live setting. Maybe it was her style of delivery or maybe it was just that the session came at the end of a long day but, while I listened and learned, I found …

A newcomer to the Reformed faith sent me an email. He wrote, “I am beginning to learn that the protestant world has catechisms. Do you recommend their reading and study? If yes, which one?” I thought I’d answer this today, relying in large part on an article I wrote a few years ago. Catechisms were an important part of my life when I was a child. I grew up in a Reformed tradition that placed great value in the Catechisms. …

This morning I read with joy an account of God’s abundant grace in the life of my friend Stacey. On her blog she wrote about God’s grace despite her long-lingering doubts about His goodness. “For the past couple of years, until not long ago actually, I was constantly plagued by doubts and uncertainty in the goodness of my God. I was confused and always questioning God, unable to read my Bible without doubting and virtually demanding explanation. … I would …

Have you ever noticed how, when a person is looking for a house, driving slowly down a darkened street straining to see the numbers on the fronts of the homes or on the mailboxes at the end of the driveways, he automatically turns down the car radio? He does so because he instinctively knows that music or voices can be a distraction. A person cannot focus as well on the task at-hand when there is noise in the background. Noise …

At four o’clock in the afternoon of August 2, 2005, I was just a few minutes into a long online training session with a software manufacturer. As we spoke, and as the technician showed me the features of this software, I suddenly noticed that it had gotten very dark in my office. I looked outside and saw that the sky was as dark as ever I’ve seen an afternoon summer sky. Within minutes rain began to fall—hard, driving rain—the kind …