My Late Father Was a Great Teacher. He Wouldn’t Last a Week in the Modern Classroom.
He understood a truth about America that has been painfully forgotten in modern times: success—even the faintest whisper or morsel of it—requires colossal sacrifice.
The notes about my father weren’t about test scores and college admission. They were about the universal aim of human flourishing. His former students flourished in their lives not because of my father’s compassion, but because of his inspiration. My father passed away a few weeks ago. He had spent his entire working life... Continue Reading
5 Bad Substitutes for Discipline
In her book Parenting Against the Tide, Ann Benton lists five poor substitutes for disciplining our children—five poor substitutes that fail to address the heart.
In this life we learn more by getting things wrong than by getting things right. It is one of the great routes to wisdom: Learn by your mistakes. A child has to have some independence in order to learn to take responsibility. They need to be let off the leash so that they will understand... Continue Reading
Getting Old is not Bad News for the Christian
While everything physical is in a constant state of decay, our inner selves are reversing the trend.
Because of God’s mercies that are new every morning, and because we are His children, we are growing in our inner selves younger – growing to look more and more like the true children of God even while our outer selves are growing older. Such is the grand and glorious paradox of Christian aging. What does... Continue Reading
The Unteachable Key to Biblical Wisdom
If being wise were as simple as just fearing God, then why does wisdom still seem so elusive for so many of us?
Though it strains against our selfish fiber, the key to biblical wisdom truly is teachability. If we would get a heart of wisdom, then we should pursue humble receptivity to God’s Word and biblical counsel. Wisdom’s house can’t be built without the stable steel of a teachable spirit. May God grow in us a longing... Continue Reading
Apple Removes Bible App From Its Store After Communist China Complains
With Apple’s removal of the Quran app and Olive Tree’s self-censorship, Chinese government pressure is now forcing American companies to do the censoring for them.
The Chinese government has ramped up restrictions limiting Chinese citizens’ access to the Bible overall. Physical copies of the Bible can no longer be purchased online in China, Christian businessmen have been prosecuted for selling audio Bibles online, and the Chinese Communist Party has announced that it is developing its own version of the Bible that will embrace socialist values.... Continue Reading
Escaping the Clever “Kafka Trap”
The secular world clearly controls the language game.
The “You’re a racist either way” charge (called a “Kafka trap”) is just one current example of the kind of nonsense used by our own culture’s thought police to cloud our minds and confuse us. Racism exists, of course, but claiming all whites are racist because they’re white simply trivializes genuine racial bigotry. The... Continue Reading
Here I Am, Send Someone Else
We must use these days wisely, for they are the only days we have. Our life is a vapor.
These are not the days for someone else! These are our days. Let us share the gospel and live obediently before the King, which entails even standing for the truth in hard seasons. I think applications abound here. But let us encourage one another all the more as we see the Day approaching. Let us... Continue Reading
Why Do We Call It Evil In The First Place?
The “problem of evil” is the highest barrier to faith for members of Gen Z and second highest (after Christian hypocrisy) for Millennials.
The problem of evil, pain, and suffering is difficult to bear on a personal level. Christians should be careful not to too-quickly dismiss the concerns of people who have experienced these very-real realities. However, the presence of these in our world does not rule out the existence of God. In fact, the presence of evil... Continue Reading
Feed the Sheep by Any Hand
Fighting Envy in Pastoral Ministry
We seek to do the church good while hoping others do more good than we ever could. Threats become brothers to us again when we learn to long for others’ success where we have failed, when we long for others to take God’s people across the Jordans we never could. When we begin to pray,... Continue Reading
“I’m Sad”
A significant portion of the Psalms do the same thing – the author pours out his heart and bares his soul to a God who listens.
So easily we lose the childlike simplicity of prayer; a child speaking to his/her father. We start to think more about the people around us that we can see than the God above whom we cannot. We pile up stock phrases or mumble our way to an amen as we prematurely reach for our fork. Even when... Continue Reading
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