Welcome to the online home of Tim Challies, blogger, author, and book reviewer.
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From time to time I like to share one of our worship services from Grace Fellowship Church. In that vein, here is how we worshiped on one October Sunday morning. This week’s cast of characters included Paul as the service leader and preacher, Allie as the lead worshiper, and Patrick as the elder who prayed and read the sermon text. The band was comprised of piano, bass, guitar, and a cajone along with a second vocalist. Welcome and Call to …
Over the past few years we have witnessed quite a number of leadership failures within the church. We have learned of pastors who have used their position to enrich themselves, to use their prominence to run roughshod over others, to use their prestige to feed their flesh. Some of these failures have been shocking, some almost expected. Some of these failures have been public, some very quiet. But each of them has, in its own way, been grievous and harmful. …
I once read of a pastor who made the commitment to spend several days out of every month with his parishioners at their workplaces. He made it his habit to arrange visits to their factories and offices, their stores and schools. He had a specific purpose in mind and one he believed would make him a more effective pastor: He wanted to understand their day-to-day lives so that in his preaching and counseling he could make application that would speak …
Bounded by a lake on its southern side, the city of Toronto and the suburbs that surround it are being steadily pushed to the east, west, and north. In these regions, developers are buying great stretches of farmland and converting them into dense neighborhoods. With hundreds of thousands of people arriving in Canada each year through immigration, and with hundreds of thousands more being born here, the demand for housing is insatiable and the city is expanding outward like a …
Every now and again I like to share one of the pastoral prayers from Grace Fellowship Church. This particular one was prayed by Paul Martin on a recent Sunday. The context, as is obvious from the prayer, is the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and, perhaps more specifically, the vaccine mandates that are taking root in our city and country. This context provides many opportunities for Christians to disagree with one another and, therefore, to become disunited. This, then, is a prayer …
It can be discouraging to see Christian leaders sometimes falter and sometimes fall. We feel residual shame when yet another well-known pastor is caught in scandal, when yet another Christian celebrity succumbs to a web of his own weaving. Yet we need to be careful that we do not make the extent of the problem greater than it is, for behind every one of these well-known, unfaithful leaders is a legion of ones who, though unknown, are faithful to God’s …
You might be tired of hearing it, but that doesn’t make it any less true—these have been difficult days for pastors. And I think you need to hear as well that there are more difficult days ahead. That being the case, for the sake of your pastor and the sake of your church, he needs you to be praying for him right now and in the weeks and months to come. Pastors, like everyone else, had their lives and routines …
Our Father, we are so thankful that you are a God who loves. In fact, you are not just a God who loves, but a God who is love. For you, love is not merely something you do, but it is who you are. To be God is to be love, to be the very source the very fountain of love. For all eternity, you have existed in a relationship of love with Father, Son, and Holy Spirit loving one …
From time to time, probably every month or so, I like to share an example of a pastoral prayer that was prayed at Grace Fellowship Church. The pastoral prayer is a time for one of the pastors or elders to pray on behalf of the congregation and to intercede on their behalf. This particular prayer was prayed by me, for our online Easter service, during the COVID-19 lockdown of 2020. *** Our Father in Heaven, In your Word you’ve told …
Can you think of a celebrity pastor whose fame is based on something other than his preaching (or on his books which are, in all likelihood, based on his preaching)? Can you think of one who is known more for his prayers than his sermons, for his words before God than his words before man? Can you think of one who is known more for his hospital visits than his pulpit proclamation? Can you think of one who is lauded …