“The thoughts of ordinary men on most things not connected with their own profession, are very indifferent. Large numbers of persons who have been accustomed to read the Bible, and to listen to preaching all their lives, have the loosest possible acquaintance with the details of Biblical history, and their concepts of doctrinal truths are …
Sarah Palin and the Narrative Arc
Political campaigns are like a jumble of improv artists crowded onto a stage, with two or three directors working with two or three competing scripts. When the audience walks away thinking that they saw “that play,” and not “the other one,” then the relevant director wins. I actually used to do something like that as …
Functional Atheism
INTRODUCTION:This psalm is a variation of the fourteenth psalm, and makes a point important enough to be repeated. And that point is that this psalm applies to the whole human race, and not just to the tiny minority willing to claim their atheism openly. This is a psalm, not about atheism proper, but about the …
The Blessed Exchange
We have gathered to call upon the name of the Lord, and the joyful solemnity of this privilege should be resting upon our shoulders like a mantle of glory. How is this possible? We do not want to overcomplicate the answer to the question. Our forms of worship and teaching are in deep sympathy with …
How Wisdom Tastes
The apostle Paul teaches us that ultimately there are only two tables in the world—the Table of the Lord and the table of demons. These tables are set in a way calculated to exclude one another—it is not possible to eat from both with any kind of consistency. We see the same thing in the …
Sinners as Open Book
Father, we bow before You now in confession, acknowledging that You are in fact the God who tests the minds and hearts of all men. We pray as part of a sinful generation, one which believes that You do not see all things, and that You cannot read the thoughts and intentions of the heart. …
Elizabeth Catherine Dodds Wilson (1919-2010)
This morning my mother went to be with her Lord and Savior after many extraordinarily fruitful years of serving Him. She was 91, and had been a follower of Christ for 75 of those years. All three of her sons live here in Moscow, and my sister Heather, who lives in California, arrived last night …
Reflections
“Shame is not honorable in itself, but it at least reflects a memory of honor” (Fidelity, p. 55).
Audio Reading of Post
All on Fire
“I want to say something about the use of the imagination. That is, in my judgment, the supreme work of preparation . . . Perception is the grasp of the actual, memory preserves it, suggestion reproduces it, comparison weighs it, reason balances it, imagination sets it all on fire” (G. Campbell Morgan, Preaching, pp. 101-102).
Sexual Confusion
“We must remember that sin muddles. It follows from this that sexual sin muddles sexually. So even though we live in a sex-crazed society, this does not mean we understand sex or sexual morality. The ‘openness’ advocated by so many actually blurs the understanding. In such a situation, God’s law illumines; disobedience results not only …