If you struggle with discontentment, you probably struggle with coveting. Jen Wilken shows how they are connected and offers some help.
In a list of clear prohibitions, the tenth word is unexpected. For all the other nine, our neighbor could hold us to account fairly simply by gathering witnesses to testify to our compliance or lack thereof. But here, at the end of the list, we find a sin of a different nature. Idol-making, Sabbath-breaking, dishonoring authority, murder, theft, adultery, and slander can all be identified by an onlooker, but not so covetousness. Covetousness hides in the heart. The Ten Words progress from “Don’t do it” to “Don’t say it” to “Don’t even think about it.”
Currently reading: The Compelling Community by Mark Dever 📚
The Bible mentions the balm of Gilead as a famous healing agent. Here’s how to harvest it.
Joshua Gibbs [via Short Letters]
anyone who thinks that the way around ChatGPT is another bullet point on the school honor code is delusional. Sorry, but some things have to change. Homework needs to change. Writing assignments need to change. We need to take ChatGPT for what it is: a referendum on modern, non-classical teaching.
Occasionally, I hear of a presbytery or session that gives theology exams as a take-home test. That should stop immediately.
Jesus’ ascension provides us with an awesome view from above—a glimpse of glory that assures us he has our lives and all things under control.
Read more for several encouraging insights on the ascension of Christ.
I’m happy to have found a Safari extension called Hush. It silences the constant cookie offers—a terrible thing for IRL, but needed right now for the web.
Letters to a Younger Ruling Elder, No. 3: The Importance of the Devotional Life
I have seen the eldership ruined more times by men, not because they were poor elders, but, sadly, because they were poor Christians.
If you dug a tunnel down to the other side of the world, you’d end up in…
You can pray the imprecatory psalms. PCA minister Benjamin Kandt explains how and why in 22 Reasons to Pray the Cursing (Imprecatory) Psalms.
Updated: my Book of Church Order commentary links page. Alan Strange is cruising! He finished the Form of Government and is working on the Book of Discipline now.
Here is my book review of The Unfolding Word: The Story of the Bible from Creation to New Creation by Zach Keele.
Despite what some assume, the percent of those who say they have no religion in America is not fated to increase. In fact, the percent of Nones, as they are called, hasn’t climbed at all in the last six years but has remained at about 20%.
This explains a shift I’ve noticed: being unaffiliated with a religion is no longer cool. I’m not saying it’s uncool to be a None, but like drinking Starbucks or wearing Crocs, it’s not an edgy alternative anymore. It can’t be when the Nones now comprise two out of ten slices of the American pie.
Figuring out what you owe God based on what other humans think is cool is a bad idea. So as the Nones are normalized and lose their cool, it’s a good time for all of us to re-examine how we relate toward God and why.
Prayer ≠ mediation.
Prayer ≠ spiritual desire
How so, George?
“Prayer is not meditation, because meditation is communing with our own souls, prayer is communing with God. Nor yet can it be said that prayer is nothing else but a spiritual desire; for prayer is the sending up of our desires to God, being put in order."
What often is true is that mediation leads to spiritual desire which leads to prayer.
🎧 Listening to The Drive Home by Austin Britton. His newest single.
Finished reading Memoir and Remains of Robert Murray M’Cheyne by Andrew Bonar a few days ago. I was very blessed by it. To get a taste for yourself, read this mini bio about his short life and the lessons we can learn from it. 📚
Suffice it to say for now, though, that all of us are theologians in one way or another. Being a theologian just means thinking and speaking about God. True, we may not do much of that. We might go for days or weeks without a thought of God entering our heads, but that is usually impossible. Things happen. Accidents. Tragedies. Deaths and funerals. Natural disasters. Illness. Loss. Suffering. Disappointment. Wrongdoing. And so on and on. There is also good fortune. Perhaps unexpected success or escape from danger or certain disaster. Experience of great beauty or pleasure. Sheer grace. Chance encounters that determine our lives. Love. We begin to wonder. God pops into our thinking and conversation. We may cry out in agony, “Why God?” or in relief, “Thank God!” Or we may just use God’s name in cursing. Sooner or later we are likely to get thinking about God and wondering if there is some logic to it all in our lives, or some injustice. We become theologians.
The question is: What kind of theologian are you? And what kind of theologian are you encouraged to be?