Today I want to scare you a little. At the very least I want to intimidate you. Actually, I want the Bible to scare and intimidate you, to set a challenge so difficult that you’ll know you can’t possibly meet it on your own. This is a challenge for any Christian, but I’m directing it particularly at younger Christians, at people in their teens or twenties. I’ve been working on a series of articles that takes a look at some …

A few weeks ago I was in Cambridge, England, participating in a writing tour and workshop. We had one afternoon to ourselves and since I was not feeling particularly creative in that moment, decided to explore the town. I happened across a museum and, since it was free, thought I’d take a look. I wandered through exhibit after exhibit, admiring ancient and medieval antiquities. My time was nearly up when I came to one final room which held a collection of paintings. …

Last week I kicked off a new series that I’m writing with younger Christians in mind—high schoolers, college students, people just getting started in the independent life. In the opening article I introduced our key verse: “Let no one despise you for your youth, but set the believers an example in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, in purity” (1 Timothy 4:12). I explained that “set an example” is a term related to the world of art and that …

I was always lousy at painting. In my high school art classes the teacher would give an assignment that involved studying a car or a human form or a bowl of fruit. Our task was to observe and then paint. I would do what she said. I would look at it, I would study it, I would observe its form, its curves, its angles, its colors, its shadows. But when I put brush to paper it would never look like …