An author named Earnest Becker won a Nobel Prize for literature in 1973 for a book he wrote entitled “The Denial of Death.” I read this book as an undergraduate student at Vanderbilt University in 1978, and I should say that it had a strong influence over my pre-salvation thinking. Becker, an atheist, sees man…
The king’s heart is a stream of water in the hand of the Lord;he turns it wherever he will.Every way of a man is right in his own eyes,but the Lord weighs the heart Proverbs 21:1–2 We are rapidly approaching election season 2024 in America. The first Tuesday of November will mark the United States’s presidential election, which we…
The gospel is, at its core, a rather simple message: There is one God who created everything. God’s pinnacle creation—man—was made to bring glory to his Creator, but he rebelled instead and became a sinner who stands condemned before this holy Creator God. But God in love and grace provided a way for the sinner…
The Search and Rescue community of the United States military embraces a bold, yet poignant motto: “that others may live.” Pararescue jumpers, or PJs, are one of the military’s most elite forces, a highly trained group serving in the Air Force and the National Guard. In battle, they’re flown behind enemy lines by brave helicopter…
There are some stories in the news that don’t seem like they’re big stories, but they are. This was especially true this past Tuesday. In the midst of international tensions rising over Russia’s posturing towards Ukraine, the convoy protests over vaccine mandates in Canada, and the new details coming to light of the Hillary Clinton…
Twenty years ago, John Piper wrote the book Brothers, We Are Not Professionals in which he pleaded with pastors to forsake thinking of pastoral ministry the way we would think of other full-time professions. Yes, the pastor’s day-to-day job includes a fair bit of administration. Yes, he must lead and organize a team of staff members….
There is one thing that I hate, yea two that I cannot stand: Hallmark Christmas movies, and walking into Christian bookstores. Why do these two things bother me so much? Well, the first is obvious, and I’m fairly certain I hold the majority opinion of every guy on the planet. Hallmark movies are boring, they’re…
A careful reading of the gospels proves Jesus Christ was often confounding the conventions of the political and cultural norms of the days during which He walked the earth. To confound means to cause surprise or confusion in someone, especially acting against their expectations. Some synonyms for the word confound are amaze, astonish, surprise, stagger,…
Give justice to me, O God, and plead my case against an unholy nation; Oh protect me from the deceitful and unrighteous man! (Ps. 43:1 LSB) Scripture tells us that God will fight our battles as we remain steadfast and faithful. This is one of the big takeaways I took with me from the 2021 G3 Conference…
