fisher of men

There is no conflict between loving truth and loving people. You really can love people as you obey Titus 1:9, which says an elder should “hold firm to the trustworthy word as taught, so that he may be able to give instruction in sound doctrine and also to rebuke those who contradict.” You can even love people as you follow Jude’s appeal that you “contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints” (Jude 1:3). A few years ago I would have been suspicious of anyone who mentioned the need to engage in theological controversy in a loving way. I would have done one of those mental clucks of the tongue and inched the person toward the “needs-to-firm-up-conviction” column. As time has passed, though, I’ve participated in a few controversies (many connected to the sovereignty of ...

A review of A Year of Biblical Womanhood: How a Liberated Woman Found Herself Siting on Her Roof, Covering Her Head, and Calling Her Husband “Master.” When I was tasked with reviewing Rachel Held Evans’ new book, I was admittedly nervous. A lot of heated discussion is circling around AYear of Biblical Womanhood, and I was hesitant to step into the fray. However, having now read the book, I’m excited to be part of the conversation. There’s a lot worth talking about, and yes, much to critique. Unfortunately, many are tossing aside this book for its flaws without considering the valid points it brings to an important conversation. Evans spent twelve months following “as many of the Bible’s teachings regarding women as possible in my day-to-day life” (xxi). Sh...

In the simplest of terms, what God wants from you is your heart. Some might hear that and think it’s the basis for a kind of sentimental religion. Others hear it and conclude that if God wants our hearts He is asking for an easy thing. But God asking for our heart, above mere behavior and agreement, is the greatest demand He can make. Asking for a man’s heart is asking for all of the man, not just part. Everything that really matters in life is done with the heart. Without the heart whatever we do is ultimately useless and fruitless. God is grieved when we “draw near” to Him in word while retreating from Him in our hearts (Isaiah 29:13). And because in all things at all times God wants our hearts we are cautioned to keep the heart (Proverbs 4:23) and “direct” ...

We all sometimes struggle to find words to express our feelings. That’s why God gave us the Psalms. An Anatomy of All the Parts of the Soul The 16th century reformer, John Calvin, called Psalms “the Anatomy of all the parts of the Soul” and observed that There is not an emotion of which any one can be conscious that is not here represented as in a mirror. Or rather, the Holy Spirit has here drawn . . . all the griefs, sorrows, fears, doubts, hopes, cares, perplexities, in short, all the distracting emotions with which the minds of men are wont to be agitated. Or, as someone else noted, while the rest of the Scripture speaks to us, the Psalms speak for us. The Psalms provide us with a rich vocabulary for speaking to God about our souls. When we long to worship, we have psalms of thanksgivin...

People believe all kinds of things about what happens when we die. One is that people become angels. Another is that we become flowers in God’s garden. But are these things true? Some may genuinely believe these things. Others may just be holding onto a nice idea while dealing with their grief. Let’s dig into the subject about angels. Do we become angels when we die or not? How do we know? Where would anyone get the idea in the first place? Do we become angels when we die? No. We do not become angels when we die. Humans are one kind of God’s creation, and angels are another. To say we become angels is to say we stop being humans. What does the Bible say about mankind and angels? Creation Psalm 8:5 says, “You have made them [human beings] a little lower than the angels and crowned them with...

Let me warn you right up front — my goal is to change the way you think about leadership. I do not aim merely to add one more voice to the conversation about leadership, I want to fundamentally change the way leadership is understood and practiced. For the better part of the last three decades, leadership has been a major cultural preoccupation and a professional obsession. Walk into an airport bookstore and you will find the front tables filled with books promising to make you a better leader. Apparently, people passing through airports have a healthy appetite for books on leadership. Walk into a Christian bookstore, and you will find ample evidence of the same hunger. If you are like me, you have probably read a small library of books on leadership, attended numerous conferences and semi...

  My thrice-great grandmother was a Choctaw Native born in South Mississippi in 1845. Her name was Clementine “Thankful” Page. I’m not sure what her parents called her in the day-to-day but I’ve imagined it would be great if she went by “Thankful.” I can imagine that name echoing through a house in those antebellum years. “Thankful, it’s time for dinner” or maybe, “Thankful, what did you do?” What a wonderful name and a great way to be remembered. For whatever reason, her parents chose to mark her life with a constant reminder of gratitude. Likewise, Christians have been given a new name in Christ and we should be marked by the virtue of thanksgiving. “Thankful” should be our name. Many nations have their own traditional “Day of Thanks.” Here in the United States, our country celebrat...

While we tend to look forward to Thanksgiving because it usually means a four-day holiday, getting together with family, and eating more food than we have all year, it is my sincere desire that it be more meaningful this year. What if Thanksgiving were the one day in which we over-emphasized what should be on our hearts every day of the year: a heart of gratitude in everything? What if our Thanksgiving prayer really thanked God for everything that has happened in the past year? God clearly spelled out His good and perfect will for us in 1 Thessalonians 5:18  when He inspired the Apostle Paul to write: “In everything give thanks, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.” Did you catch that? In everything. In the good times, as well as the bad. In the pleas...

To help stimulate a kind of deeper gratitude, my family has adopted a Thanksgiving tradition we’ve found extremely helpful. Each year after our Thanksgiving meal we gather in our living room and simply recite the blessings of God that have touched our lives. One by one we circle the room, each one of us expressing our gratitude to God for His many physical and spiritual blessings. Allow me to share with you just five blessings that deeply touch me every year and prompt me to thank God. Perhaps it’ll catch and you’ll be able to rekindle your gratitude! You’re Saved and You Know It No work of God’s is more beyond my comprehension yet closer to my heart and more worthy of gratitude than salvation. Before coming to know Christ, each of us lived in a self-imposed p...

As the earliest extra-biblical Christian confessional document, the Apostles’ Creed has stood the test of time as the preeminent testament to creedal orthodoxy.  The creed, attributed to the earliest missionary followers of Jesus, distills the basic outline of what it means to be a Christian into a short summation that belies the depth and richness of what it proclaims. The Apostles’ Creed We believe in God, the Father Almighty, the Maker of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord: Who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried; (He descended into hell.)1 On the third day He rose again from the dead; He ascended into heaven, and sits at the right hand of God the Father; from which he w...

  The alarm clock beeps incessantly. Morning again. Reaching over, he fumbles with it a little before finding the snooze button. A few more minutes won’t hurt. A few more minutes to rest. But he can’t sleep. His mind already swirls with thoughts of the day ahead. So much to do. Little details, big projects, meetings. It’s going to be a busy day. And, when it’s done, what does he have to look forward to? Doing it all over again. Tomorrow will be exactly the same. Hit the snooze button a few times, get out of bed, and face the same job, the same tasks, the same routine. He feels like Bill Murray in Groundhog Day, endlessly living the same day over and over again, constantly confronted with the pointlessness of it all. But hey, at least it’s a paycheck. He’s got bills to pay and grocerie...

Have you ever seen Miracle on 34th Street? It’s a Christmas classic. The 1947 novel became a movie the same year, earning the author an Academy Award for the Best Original Story. The film itself was nominated for the top picture. Edmund Gwenn, who played Kris Kringle, won an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor. But who could ever forget the child actor, Natalie Wood, who won the hearts of viewers as Susan Walker, the little girl whose doubt in the existence of Santa Claus is transformed by her association with Edmund Gwenn’s Kris Kringle. “Miracle on 34th Street stands beside It’s a Wonderful Life as one of the two most enduring of America’s holiday movies,” says Frank Beaver, professor of film and video studies at the University of Michigan. “As ...