Reflections on the loving kindness of the Triune God
Last week I wrote of the importance of the Word. This week we take up prayer—the spontaneous complement to Bible reading. As I noted once before, the two go together. God offers his heart in the Scriptures and we share our hearts, in return, through our prayers. As in any conversation each party must have …
Read More PrayerI’m listening to God right now. He’s using the voice of a BBC newsman telling us that an Iceland volcano is still disrupting airline flights throughout Europe. The map on the television shows that Estonia, where I’ve been speaking, is right at the center of the ash cloud. So my scheduled flight to London today …
Read More Listening to GodSteve Mitchell is a dear friend who has posted here before. Whatever he writes is always a good stir: honest, reflective, and challenging. Here is more of the same. He not only moved me to reflect on worship, but to worship. Please join us. My wife and I recently were privileged to spend several hours …
Read More Lavish WorshipHow, as a believer, am I to relate to “the law” in Scriptures? The apostle Paul wrote to Timothy, “Now we know that the law is good, if one uses it lawfully” [1 Timothy 1:5]. There was, it seems, some sort of law-abuse going on in Ephesus where Timothy was a pastoral leader. Yet to say …
Read More A Lawful Use of the LawLet me ask a question: do we think and learn by collecting and affirming every idea we’ve ever heard, so that all we’ve heard grows into a single collection of “truth”? Or do we try to sort out the things that are true from the things that aren’t true? If for instance, someone tells us, …
Read More A Clear View of ChristI enjoy life. I enjoy it a lot! But I know that not everyone can say the same. In many cases that’s because of hard circumstances. Who, for instance, can enjoy a life out of balance because of a tragedy, or a life deprived of some basic needs, or a life broken by the abusive …
Read More Enjoying Life!I was in trouble with my high school English teacher. It was in my sophomore year—not long before I met Christ at summer camp—that she called me aside. “Where did this writing come from? You’ve plagiarized this project, haven’t you!” I was stunned. The project was a simple composition that I had taken very seriously, …
Read More Treasuring TimeThis weekend was full: I was asked to be the Sunday speaker at a church missions conference. My assigned text? Matthew 22:37-39, “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all …
Read More The Divine MissionI find myself busy these days with other writing duties, so I needed to rely on a guest to meet my goal of offering a weekly entry here. And, as regular readers well know, the change of voice that comes with guest entries can be very satisfying. Mark is one of my favorite people and …
Read More A Room Full of StrangersAllen Bloom wrote The Closing of the American Mind in the 1980’s as a criticism of the growing relativism in the modern academy and in society at large. That relativism has two axioms: first that everyone should be free to hold their own opinion without having others criticize them; and, second, that every viewpoint is …
Read More The Closing of the Human Heart