Whatever happened to “bloom where you’re planted” as an ethos for ministry?  If God is calling you to the urban core, go to the urban core.  If God has called you to suburbia, stay in suburbia, or go there, if you’re someplace else.  And if you think God is calling you to exurbia or rural... Continue Reading

Nevertheless, since Gosnell will now get life instead of death, let us pray he gets life indeed. Time in prison means time for repentance, and repentance of a sinner is always the heart of God, who “is not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance” (2 Peter 3:9). Scripture exhorts us... Continue Reading

My role is not exactly like that of other married women; my life as Mrs. Pastor, by God’s design, is unique. Thankfully, I have fundamentals to guide me, such as God’s inspired Word, my husband’s biblical wisdom and the needs of God’s people. After that, I use my God-given gifts, prayer and the guidance of the Holy... Continue Reading

But, and this is key, that does not mean every sin is equally heinous. Missing in Piper’s analysis is a careful discussion about how some sins are more grievous than others and therefore warrant a more vigorous Christian response. I appreciate Robert Gagnon’s fine response to this problem: …   In a recent article, Barnabas... Continue Reading

In any case, what we have is a failure to communicate that is leading to serious misunderstanding and misrepresentation. The purpose of this brief post is to explain what the traditional Reformed doctrine of general revelation is, and just as importantly, to explain what the traditional Reformed doctrine of general revelation is not.   In the... Continue Reading

In response to the laziness of Southern Baptists and the non-existent fervor for soul-winning in SBC churches, pastors have resorted to using unbiblical methods to get lost people in the doors of the church for worship. Pastors, God’s shepherds, have sought to adjust worship within the Body of Christ to appeal to those who are... Continue Reading

I’ve been bitten by a serpent-shaped lie that says I can orchestrate all the details of my life. That I can plan them and execute all on my own. The lie then produces fear when the reality crashes in that I actually can’t do it at all. Because rather than being in control of all... Continue Reading

And then finally, the pièce de resistance, the moment to which the whole service had been leading, the climactic moment when the congregation was taken to the very gates of heaven: the service ended, not with a benediction or even a prayer, but with another chance to meditate, this time not to waves crashing on... Continue Reading

In choosing to remove this beautiful song from the hymnal, the committee suggests that this notion of God’s wrath is no longer compelling to the majority of PC(USA) congregants. I fear that this is yet another symptom of our loss of any sense of sin that is personal (rather than systemic) and of our cheapening... Continue Reading

But those churches who would accept sinners “as they are” (whether homosexuals or any other variety of sinner) into their memberships, and who would encourage such sinners to ponder the glories of justification rather than repent, engage in a great evil. Such acceptance violates this and every biblical text on church discipline, destroys the purity... Continue Reading