Blogs

Forward From Conversion: How We Can Focus on Spiritual Growth and Transformation | Ed Stetzer
The more I’ve been involved in churches, the more I’ve seen this as the number one priority for the health of the Church and its members. We cannot assume that people will grow in Christian knowledge, experience, and practice without significant input and accountability.

A Quick 9-Point Illustration Checklist | Biblical Preaching
Hopefully the result will not be less illustrations but better ones.

Spies and Lies | Mike Wittmer
Mike offers a defense of the tactics that produced the Planned Parenthood horror films. Here Joe Carter gives you 10 Numbers You Should Know About Planned Parenthood and Aaron Armstrong writes about Changing Opinions on Abortion When Legislation Isn’t an Adoption.

Theological Heroes and Villains | Tim Challies
The principle in this article would save a lot of relationships, especially of those inclined to perfectionism in their expectations of others.

The Happy Man
You might be interested to know that the first church I pastored was in Lachlan Mackenzie’s parish of Lochcarron. I used to preach from his pulpit in a small meeting house in Kishorn. On the same subject here’s Why Happy Employees Are More Productive at Work.

A Quick Guide to Common Writing Errors

Kindle Books

Homeschooling the Challenging Child: A Practical Guide $2.99.

And here are a few other Homeschooling books at good prices:

Don’t Waste Your Time Homeschooling: 72 Things I Wish I’d Known $2.99.

Homeschooling Boys – Gaining Maximum Success from Minimum Cooperation $0.99.

Simplify Your Homeschool Day: Shorten Your Day, Sweeten Your Time $3.99.

Called Home: Finding Joy in Letting God Lead Your Homeschool $0.99.

50 People Every Christian Should Know: Learning from Spiritual Giants of the Faith by Warren Wiersbe $1.99.

131 Christians Everyone Should Know by Mark Galli $2.99.

New Book

Called for Life: How Loving Our Neighbor Led Us into the Heart of the Ebola Epidemic $9.99.

Video

The Power of Morning & Evening Routines (HT: Tim Challies)

Blogs

Christian Bakery Closed for Refusing to Bake Lesbian Wedding Cake Breaks Crowdfunding Record with $352,000.

Were Early Churches Ruled by Elders or a Local Bishop? | Michael Kruger

Textiquette For Teenagers | Barry York

Dick Lucas on the Need of the Moment | Proclamation Trust

How We Became Too Busy For Friends | Her.meneutics

Review of Spiritual Friendship: Finding Love in the Church as a Gay Christian | Sam Alberry

On Valorizing Gay Marriage | Stand Firm

Kindle Books

There are some tremendous history books on sale at Amazon right now. Here’s a sample, and you can check out others here:

The Class of 1846: From West Point to Appomattox: Stonewall Jackson, George McClellan, and Their Brothers $1.99.

D DAY – Through German Eyes – The Hidden Story of June 6th 1944 $2.99.

Henry Clay: The Essential American $1.99.

The Nuremberg Trial $1.99.

Video

Pray the Bible: 5-Day Course With Don Whitney

Sign up here. Buy the book here.

The global hair care market is estimated to be worth $81 billion dollars in 2015, with a large part of that being spent on various gels that shape and control the hair. All that money to beautify ourselves and make us more attractive to others!

But there’s a free “hair gel” that can make us more attractive and beautiful, not just to others but to God.

“Let the righteous strike me; it shall be a kindness.
And let him rebuke me; it shall be as excellent oil; let my head not refuse it” (Ps. 141:5).

Rebuking sin is not the most popular gel – few can apply it properly and even fewer can receive it properly – but it can produce stunning results.

Two Very Different Callings

There’s been a welcome resurgence of the Christian doctrine of vocation and calling over the past years, helping many Christians to see their work as an essential part of their service to and worship of God.

But it’s vital that we don’t confuse it with the Christian doctrine of effectual calling.

The difference?

Vocational calling is God “calling” us into work that fits our gifts and talents. He is bringing out of us what is already there so that we find ourselves suited to certain kinds of work.

Effectual calling is God calling us out of darkness and into light. He didn’t call out of us what was already there; by His call, He put something in us that was never there before. He didn’t match what we were with something that fitted us; He made us fit for something totally unlike us. He didn’t match our passions with opportunities; He gave us passions for what we previously hated.

Your Phone Knows if You’re Depressed

Your phone may be able to tell if you’re depressed with 87% accuracy, according to a small new study published in the Journal of Medical Internet Research, and summarized in Time. Some useful stats and information:

• The more time people spend on their phones, the more likely they are to be depressed.
• Spending lots of time at home was linked to depression.
• People who stuck to a regular pattern of movement tended to be less depressed, but depression pulled people off their routine.
• Depressed people spent an average of 68 minutes using their phones each day, while people without depression only spent about 17 minutes on their phones.
• When people are depressed, they tend to start avoiding tasks or things they have to do, often using their phones as a distraction.

The study seems to assume that excessive cellphone is a symptom of depression. It does not seem to consider the possibility that it may also be the cause of it.

McDonald’s Franchises Have Never Been This Depressed

Staying with the subject of depression, Macdonald’s franchisees are seeing a continuing slump in profits and hope. If you’ve been following this story, you’ll know that Macdonald’s profits have been shrinking for many consecutive months despite innumerable menu re-launches, and other gimmicks intended to reverse the decline.

The one thing they don’t seem to have tried is to make a decent burger! They can add all the frills and promos they like, but if they can’t cook a hot, moist, tasty burger, they’re finished.

It’s kind of like Starbucks of a few years ago, when it had become almost impossible to predict whether you were going to walk out with a lukewarm cup of dirty water or a good dose of caffeine.

If a burger joint can’t make a burger that tastes like meat, and if a coffee shop can’t make a coffee that tastes like coffee, they’re sunk. Whatever else they do, they’ve got to get their core product right.

Same goes for the church. You can have all the frills, you can have slick marketing, you can have multiple programs for kids and pets, and you can re-launch every other Sunday; but without a core of faithful and worshipful preaching of God’s Word, just shut the doors and let someone cook burgers or serve coffee. They’ll do far more good.

Blogs

4 Really Good Money Questions | Tim Challies

Six Thoughts About Proper Pastoral Attire For Worship | Thom Rainer

5 Great Reasons You Should Take a Walk Today | Cleveland Clinic

Augustine on Using Other Preacher’s Work | Gentle Reformation

20 Quotes From Rosaria Butterfield’s New Book on Sexual Identity | Rosaria Butterfield

Why the President of Planned Parenthood’s Apology Doesn’t Work | Denny Burk

What Does The Rainbow Mean For Gays? | Desiring God

40 Answers and 2 Questions For Matthew Vines | Michael Brown

Kindle Books

The Secret Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert: Expanded Edition by Rosaria Butterfield $0.99.

Autopsy of a Deceased Church: 12 Ways to Keep Yours Alive by Thom Rainer $4.99

Brothers, We Are Not Professionals: A Plea to Pastors for Radical Ministry by John Piper $0.99.

Recommended New Book

Openness Unhindered: Further Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert on Sexual Identity and Union with Christ by Rosaria Butterfield.

Blogs

7 Questions Leaders Should Use Often – Ron Edmondson

7 Statements Every Leader Should Use Often | Ron Edmondson

Joyful Exiles | Christward Collective

Is Your Joy Real or an Imposter? | Sam Storms

Online Theological Resources | Preachers and Preaching

How Should Christians Respond to Attacks and Insults | R C Sproul

Bruce Jenner, Gay Marriage, and Planned Parenthood: The Self-Deification of a Nation

Want a Fetal Liver: Add it to your StemExpress Wishlist | Ed Stetzer

Ligonier’s $5 Friday Sale (includes John Gerstner teaching series on Westminster Confession)

3 Helpful Instructions on Keeping a Journal | Tim Challies

How to Support a Partner Struggling with Depression | Lifehacker

Kindle Books

The Rage Against God: How Atheism Led Me to Faith by Peter Hitchens $1.99

Raising Responsible Teens in a Digital World by Brian Housman $1.99.

Theirs Is the Kingdom: Celebrating the Gospel in Urban America by Roger Lupton $1.99.

Five Views on Law and Gospel: Counterpoints $5.99.

Good food is necessary, enjoyable, satisfying, energizing, motivating, reviving, and strengthening.

Jesus said, “My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me, and to finish His work” (John 4:34).

Imagine how our lives would be transformed if we ate such a healthy diet every day.

Poking God in the Eye

You know how you feel when someone hurts one of your children or a really close friend?

Well multiply that fierce protectiveness by a million (and strip it of all sin) and you are getting closer to how God responds when His children are hurt or offended. As Zechariah records, “He who touches you touches the apple of His eye” (Zech. 2:8).

As verbal and judicial persecution is touching more and more Christians in the West, remember it’s also touching the apple of God’s eye.

When was the last time someone poked a lion in the eye and prospered?

Projecting Our Sins On To Others

It’s extremely painful to be on the receiving end of false accusations, especially when it’s in an area where we have taken great pains to keep our consciences clear before God. Yet, despite our efforts, people think the worst and say the worst about us.

Over the years, though, I’ve come to realize that such accusations say more about our accusers than about us.  They think that everyone acts the same sinful way as they do in similar situations and therefore project these sins on to others, even those who are completely innocent.

Thinking along these lines makes us pray for false accusers rather than retaliate against them.

And the next time you are tempted to think or say the worst about anyone, ask yourself, “Am I simply projecting my own evil on to others who are innocent?”

Why is Everybody Else Getting Old?

I’m back in the UK for a surprise visit to my parents on the occasion of their Golden Wedding Anniversary. We also managed to squeeze in a few days in the Isle of Lewis and I’ve had the joy of bumping into a number of friends from my previous congregation. Eight years on, age has taken it’s horrifying toll, with some barely recognizable.

And yet, as I look in the mirror, I’m convinced I’m still looking like a 25-year-old than like an-almost-50-year-old. Am I the only one in the world who isn’t aging?

No, this is part of the vanity and deceitfulness of the human heart that somehow convinces us that aging is something that happens to others while giving us a pass. Why can we see it so obviously in others but can be so blind to the ravages of time in ourselves?

I doubt everyone is saying to themselves when they meet me, “Wow, he looks so young still!” when I’m saying of everyone, “Wow, he/she looks so old now.”

“Lord, make me to know my end, and what is the measure of my days, that I may know how frail I am” (Ps. 39:4).