Welcome to the online home of Tim Challies, blogger, author, and book reviewer.
Trending Topics
#pornography
#prayer
#schooling
Today is the long-awaited site upgrade. It’s long-awaited in my books, anyway. I designed this new version of the site several months ago now. It has taken a long time to come to fruition, primarily because I’ve been so busy with the rest of life. First off, if you are a RSS subscriber, you will probably not notice much of a difference except that you may find that the feed has “reset” meaning that it says there are twenty or …
You know that every now and again I like to post a prayer here. Sometimes it is a prayer from long ago, sometimes it is a prayer that is much more recent. This week I was looking at pastor Scotty Smith’s blog and came across a great prayer–one I could fully identify with and one I so badly needed to pray, too. Smith based it on this passage: “So they hurried off and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby, …
It was November 1, 2003 when I decided I’d commit to blogging every day for a full year. I was getting lazy with blogging and had given it little effort in the weeks leading up to that day. I figured I should either commit to doing it on a very regular basis or give it up altogether. A year later I had managed to blog every day and thought it would be good to renew the commitment. I’ve done that …
It must be a year or two now since I first began running a bit of advertising on my web site. Initially I did so because the costs of running the site were increasing and advertising offered a means of offsetting those costs. As time has gone on, it has continued to cover the infrastructure costs and has also been able to go toward some of the books I buy to review and, when it exceeds that, to support my …
This is one of my favorites from The Valley of Vision as much for the concept of the prayer as its actual words. This is a prayer meant to follow prayer. Read it and I’m sure you’ll see, as I do, just how weak and listless my prayers actually are and how much even my best efforts in prayer and praise and petition are in need of God’s grace. Bewail your prayers and thank God that he hears them and …
I spent some time this morning writing an article for a magazine. They had requested a 600-word article on “What is the greatest hindrance to the gospel today?” I’ve found that articles like this pose a special kind of challenge to me. While I take time to write every day, far more often than not I am writing about what I want to write about. I set my own topics and write about whatever interests me that day. Writing for …
October 31, one week from today, will mark the 491st anniversary of the day that Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses to the door of the church at Wittenburg. In so doing he struck a match, beginning a fire that quickly spread throughout Europe and throughout the world. Having become increasingly disillusioned with the doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church, and in particular the sale of indulgences, Luther wrote his Theses to try to begin the process of reform. While …
In the past months the server that hosts this site has been dragging a little bit. It has gone down a few times and has begin consuming too many resources. And so I’ve decided to move to a new server with a host that is dedicated to supporting Movabletype, the software that runs behind the scenes here. While I was going through all the trouble of moving to the new server, I decided to rebuild the site’s templates from the …
Last year around this time I began what I suppose is about to become a tradition—I made up a book guide to help people choose books to buy others for Christmas (or, of course, just to buy for themselves). As you know, I read and review a lot of books, usually around 100 per year. I have been pleased to find that others are able to benefit from my love of reading through these reviews. It has always been my …
As you’ve no doubt noticed by now, I’ve begun to do a bit of advertising through this site. I have added spots for three 125 x 125 banner ads in the right sidebar and have also opened up a bit of space for some text ads. Though I’m somewhat leery of doing this, I explained last week that the time has come, I think, to attempt to monetize the blog just a little bit. I think it offers a good …