Let me be blunt: if you think praying, singing, preaching, Scripture reading, and the ordinances are cold and stale, the problem isn’t with those elements of corporate worship. The problem may be your heart. Now it is certainly possible that leaders and church members can go through the motions of a service’s liturgy and be void... Continue Reading

The Puritans were not content with a mere head knowledge of God and Christ. Their chief desire in their meditation was to fan the flames of their desire for Christ and to look more like him in their thoughts, words, and deeds. Consequently the Puritans have given us a wonderful example of how faithful biblical... Continue Reading

Genesis 10 leaves us with a map of the world that is defined by God’s sovereignty. It tells us that the nations are not accidents of history. As Paul would later preach in Athens, God “made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted... Continue Reading

“If somebody asked you, “Why did Jesus come into this world?” I doubt you would have answered that he came to cast fire on the earth. But that’s what He said here. He’s not only announced that He was going to send fire on the earth, but he communicated his own feelings about that task,... Continue Reading

Will you be content when the pastor and/or elders teach a view in line with the Standards, a view that you don’t personally hold? I say this to our shame. Many Presbyterians take exceptions, sometimes a handful of them. I say this also to our shame. When someone says he takes no exceptions, some men... Continue Reading

We are cancer comrades—and that makes for a pervasive sense of sympathy all around. The ward is a place where empathy gas seems pumped through the vents to fill the room. It’s where you can fairly safely say (even if you never actually say it), “I know what you’re feeling,” because you do; at least... Continue Reading

Let your guard down and be okay with telling your “unspoken” to some folks who you really trust. Everyone around you is struggling with sin in some form or fashion, so you’re not catching anyone by surprise. (Most of the time I think it’s safe to say “unspoken” are related to one’s personal struggle with... Continue Reading

The moral conviction of Proverbs is that eventually the proud will fall. “These men lie in wait for their own blood; they set an ambush for their own lives.” (Pro 1:18, ESV) Like the people at the tower of Babel, they gather to build a tower to heaven and end scattered by God over the... Continue Reading

Self-righteousness is insidious and pervasive, extending its tentacles, trapping and blinding us. Often, our motivations remain hidden even from ourselves. In Confessions, Augustine observes how God upends human assessments of behavior: “Your witness condemns many deeds that receive human praise,” he writes. “For it often happens that the appearance of an act belies what the... Continue Reading

Far from climbing up, you’ve been mired in the muck and grime of temporal desires with no progress toward true enlightenment and hope. The systems of strength and security that you’ve trusted in seem like a cardboard fort in the brilliance of the true light. Your world changes in the light, for even as it... Continue Reading