While there are many places you can go today to find deals on electronics and other big-ticket items, I like to provide a place for Christian retailers to make their deals known to Christians who are trying to kick-start their Christmas shopping (or to just buy great resources at significant discounts). I will update this list regularly throughout the weekend, so you may want to return to a few times. Be sure to check back on Monday for Cyber Monday deals.

Amazon
Amazon has discounts on thousands of items. Of interest to me is their Kindle e-readers (and other devices) which are on sale today.

Kindle Oasis (my preferred device), Kindle Paperwhite, or Kindle (basic)
C.S. Lewis Signature Classics at 63% off
A large selection of board games are 50% off or more (including family favorites like Ticket to Ride, Catan, Pandemic, and literally hundreds more)
A lot of building toys like Knex, Lego, etc, as well as learning and tech toys
Home brands like KitchenAid, Ninja, Nespresso, Bissell, Vitamix, De’Longhi, Keurig, Yeti, and Amazon
Significant savings on 2023’s most popular general market books in their print versions (which includes Jinger Duggar Vuolo’s Becoming Free Indeed)
There is also a long list of “religion and spirituality” books discounted in their print versions. Among them you’ll find some good picks such as;

And then, of course, much, much more.
Westminster Books
Westminster Books has 200 of their best and bestselling books on sale with discounts in the range of 50% – 70% off. Here are some representative deals:

They also have all ESVs at 50% off:

You might also like to look at their Christmas Gift Guide for gift ideas.
Logos
Logos has a host of products discounted (with many more coming on Cyber Monday). Here’s what they are offering for Black Friday:

If I had to pick, I’d focus on getting the Reformed Expository bundles (which are ideal for pastors or general readers) and select volumes in the NICOT and NICNT series. You also can’t go wrong with any of the Preaching the Word commentaries. The Christ Centered Exposition series is a reader-friendly option as well.
10ofThose
10ofThose, which is both a bookstore and a publisher, has a wide selection of books discounted up to 77%. They include:

10ofThose also provides the storefront for The Gospel Coalition and is offering many TGC products with similar discounts.
Accordance
Accordance is keeping it simple by offering a blanket 25% off anything with the coupon code 25-ALL.
Banner of Truth
Banner of Truth is having their annual Christmas sale with deals of up to 50% off. This PDF has the details. It looks like some of their sets of books have the best discounts.
Christian Book Distributors
Christian Book Distributors has lots of deals on books and Bibles.

Crossway
Crossway+ members can browse the Christmas Gift Guide and order anything at 50% off. Crossway+ membership is free.
The Good Book Company
The Good Book Company is offering 30% off everything on their site plus free shipping. Bundles and sets are discounted up to 40%.
Ligonier Ministries
Ligonier Ministries is having a $5 sale Friday (and more) sale that includes discounts on many books, Bibles, teaching series, and so on.
Matthias Media
Matthias Media has a good selection of their books on sale. Many are as low as $3 or $5.
Missional Wear
Missional Wear has select products at up to 50% off, plus you can save 15% site-wide using discount code CHALLIES15.
P&R Publishing
P&R is offering 35% off all titles with coupon code NOV23. Select titles are discounted 40% off.
Reformation Heritage Books
Reformation Heritage Books has a wide variety of their books and series on sale.
Visual Theology
Visual Theology is offering 50% off memberships with code BLACK2023. Digital Bible Cards and the 2023 Gospel Advent Calendar are also half off with BLACK2023. Then be sure to take a look at their new Advent Coloring Book.
Wretched
Wretched, aka Todd Friel, has up to 50% off on books, booklets, DVDs, merch, and so on.

Every one of us has become familiar with the pattern. Every one of us has seen church members becoming dissatisfied and then disgruntled, missing church occasionally and then consistently. Every one of us has seen the pattern and begun to dread the nearly-inevitable conclusion. This is especially discouraging when the reason for the departure is not an area of essential theological disagreement but something much more common and much less important—hurt feelings, petty squabbles, matters of preference.

This pattern is so common that we should all assume we ourselves may at some time fall into it. This being the case, what should you do when you begin feeling discontent at your church? What should you do when you feel that yearning to pick up and move on? What should you do when you find yourself eager to slip out of one church and into another? I’d like to offer just a few suggestions that I hope you’ll consider and put into practice.
Pray through the directory. Find yourself a copy of the church directory and commit to praying through the entire thing at least once. Pray for each person or each family by name. Pray what the Bible models and pray what the Spirit prompts. Prayer is one of our core responsibilities toward one another and has a way of stirring up our affections. As you pray for those people may it remind you that you’re not just walking away from a club or institution, but from a community—a family, even.
Commit to serving. The temptation when disgruntled is always to stop serving—to remove yourself from whatever ministries you’ve been involved with. Before you leave, recommit to serving others for a period of time—several months at least. Love tends to grow cold when we stop loving others and it tends to be rekindled when we start loving again. Plus, it’s as we serve that the Lord reminds us that he has gifted us specifically so we can use his gifts to bless our fellow Christians.
(Parenthetically, it is almost universally true that when people leave churches for reasons that are poor or inadequate, they have stopped praying for their fellow church members and have stopped serving them. Rarely do people leave when they are constant in prayer and diligent in service.)
Remember the good, not just the bad. In times when we are hurt or discouraged we usually find ourselves fixating on what others have done wrong, not what they have done right. So as you consider leaving, force yourself to remember not only the church’s failings, but also its blessings. Remember not only the bad times, but also the good, not only the times it fell short, but also the times it rallied to the cause. Remember all the times it blessed you, expressed kindness to you, and supported you. You may find this side of the scale by far outweighs the other.
Think it through. There may be many good reasons to leave one church for another, but there are certainly many bad ones. The worst reason of all is allowing unidentified or unrepentant sin to be the determining factor. Hence, before you leave any church, think carefully about whether sin or sanctification is leading the way—whether you feel the need to leave because you have grown in holiness or because you have diminished in holiness. Too many people allow sin, not the Spirit, to lead them out the door.
Pray it through. The only way to adequately think it through is to pray it through. You need to labor in prayer to become convinced that your departure is consistent with God’s will. Pray for God to expose your heart, to guide your feelings, to make your motives clear. Pray that your deepest desire would be to honor and glorify him, whether that means leaving or staying.
Talk it through. It is possible that the church is in error, but it’s also possible that you are in error. It is possible there is a sore problem with the church’s leadership, but it is also possible that there is a sore problem with your sanctification. Have the character and honesty to ask someone, “Am I making a wise decision?” And make sure that individual is the type who will challenge you if you need to be challenged. Don’t leave if trustworthy men and women are telling you to stay.
The fact is that in a consumeristic culture like this one—a culture in which the customer is always right—too many people leave too many churches too easily. It’s unlikely that any of us is above the temptation to depart for poor reasons and to leave behind us a trail of hurt and confusion. So before you make that decision, pray for the people of the church and diligently serve them. Ask God for wisdom and ask others for guidance. And then, only then, leave with confidence that your departure is God’s will. As you do so, you will have honored God, served others, and modeled how to leave a church well.

If you’re into Kindle deals, remember that I’ve got an X account for that: @challiesdeals. Also by way of reminder, much of my material gets translated into Spanish and you can find that here.

Today’s Kindle deals include some good books: Serving Without Sinking, Write It On Their Hearts, and more.

(Yesterday on the blog: Marriage Happy, Marriage Holy)

I have been intrigued by the recent revival of interest in Stoicism. That is why I was glad to see this article by Jonathan Threlfall.

Samuel James offers some interesting theses on Instagram. For example: “Of all the major social media apps of the last 20 years, Instagram is the most distinctly feminine. Compared to its peers, IG is a beautiful app. It feels. It has a humane and relational texture that other apps, especially Twitter and Facebook, lack. Several things about IG create this, chief among them the app’s reliance on images of people as its main form of communication.”

That is a common question and in this video it gets a good answer.

“Although the lack of workers for the harvest has been a persistent problem since the time of Christ, nowadays there is a new and noticeable trend in missions: those who go don’t necessarily stay.”

I know I recently shared a different theologian’s answer to this question, but considering how often I am asked it, I thought it would not hurt to double up.

Yeah, maybe you should. Maybe we all should.

When I look at your generation, I love the ambition I see, but want to encourage you to pursue the traits that will harness that ambition to the best and highest purposes.

As the social cost of claiming to be a Christian increases, the percentage of nominal Christians decreases.
—D.A. Carson