Esther was more man than most men I know, myself included. Many of us – men and women – are extremely passive and cowardly. We don’t take risks for God because we are obsessed with safety, security, and most of all, with the future.
Just remember the most serious threats are spiritual. When we are crazy busy, we put our souls at risk. The challenge is not merely to make a few bad habits go away. The challenge is to not let our spiritual lives slip away.
We don’t expect to be able to buy anything we want, because we know there is a limit to our money. But somehow we live as if time knew no bounds, when in fact time is much more limited than money.
One of the most resilient and cherished myths of parenting is that parenting creates the child.
The biggest deception of our digital age may be the lie that says we can be omni-competent, omni-informed, and omni-present.
We are not our own: in so far as we can, let us therefore forget ourselves and all that is ours.
What makes the Bible utterly unlike any other book – religious or otherwise – is the unsurpassed grace we encounter in its pages. We need Scripture because without it we cannot know the love of God.
But when interpreted correctly – paying attention to the original context, considering the literary genre, thinking through authorial intent – the Bible is never wrong in what it affirms and must never be marginalized as anything less than the last word on everything it teaches.
At the Lausanne missions gathering in 2010, John Piper made the statement that “we should care about all suffering, especially eternal suffering.” He chose the word “care” quite carefully. He didn’t want to say we should do something about all suffering, because we can’t do something about everything. But we can care.
As Christians we ought to fear being on the wrong side of the holy, apostolic, and universal church more than we fear being on the wrong side of discredited assumptions about progress and enlightenment.
The less we expect to suffer, the more devastating suffering is to bear.
Opportunities have often felt like obligations to me.
The person who never sets priorities is the person who does not believe in his own finitude.
Opening our home to others is a wonderful gift and a neglected discipline in the church.
So much of our busyness comes down to meeting people’s expectations.
Taking a strange book seriously, Leviticus 18, 20.
Battling busyness is a community response.
The most important decision we face is the daily decision to live for Christ and die to self.
We must make learning from Him and taking time to be with Him a priority.
Bad theology leads to despair, and proud theology leads to disdain. But humble, heartfelt Reformed theology should always lead to doxology.
We must be given a new heart. We must be regenerated. We must be converted. We must be changed. The Christian life-the life of faith in God, hope in Christ, and love for others-necessitates, first of all, a life that has been given a supernatural new start by the Holy Spirit. We must be born again.