This Free Stuff Fridays post is sponsored by the Reformed Free Publishing Association (RFPA), whose mission is to glorify God through the publication and distribution of Reformed literature. They are giving away 10 copies of Journey Through the Psalms: A Thirty-Day Devotional for ages 9-13.
Sign up with your email below for a chance to win a free copy of Journey Through the Psalms! In this devotional for ages 9–13, readers will travel through several time periods, starting with Israel in the wilderness, then through the life of David, the captivity of Judah, and finally Christ’s work on earth. You will tour many important sites like caves, palaces, and even a national park. You’ll also make some stops along the way to consider spiritual topics from the psalms that are still relevant for young Christians today. 
Author Mike Velthouse is an avid reader. In 2020 he began writing articles for his church’s newsletter about people and places from Bible history. Since then he has published many articles for children in the magazine Ignited by the Word. Mike lives in Michigan near his three adult daughters and granddaughter. Journey Through the Psalms is his first book.
Illustrator Erinn Kuiper is a wife and a mom to four children. She enjoys working with watercolors and especially likes to paint greeting cards. Erinn lives in Michigan.
Only one entry will be accepted per valid email address. Entries will close at 11:59 p.m. ET on July 4, 2024. Winners will be notified by email during the week of July 8. 

May the God of love and peace be with you today.

(Yesterday on the blog: Another Week in a Difficult and Hostile World)
Grief Is Not the Enemy
“Like love or joy or hope, grief is not less than an emotion, but it is also much more. And certainly, love and joy are tightly connected with grief. We cannot truly grieve something or someone unless we love them first and take joy in them. It would be natural to think of grief as the opposite of joy, or the absence of love, but that’s not quite right.”
How to Think Wisely About Becoming a Social Media Celebrity
“Most of us are still trying to figure out what we want to be when we grow up. There’s got to be that perfect job out there somewhere, where I can make a ton of money, impact the world for good, be respected and adored, be myself, and do what I love.” For a growing number of younger people, that’s being a social media influencer.
How Will I Find My Ministry Calling?
Whatever vocation you’re pursuing, here’s some counsel from John Piper on finding it—though it’s especially related to ministry.
Join Tim Challies At The SING! Conference
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EXCLUSIVE: Visit singconference.com and use code ‘CHALLIES35’ to save 35% before General Registration closes June 17. (Sponsored Link)
The Churches of Antarctica
I enjoyed this little roundup of the churches of Antarctica. It’s a continent so thinly-populated that it’s possible to show photos of almost all of them.
We Rest to Work
Guy Richards continues his series on rest: “Rest in a post-Fall world should be directed to the end of enabling us to fulfill our mandate to work. This sets boundaries on how much we rest and what that rest looks like. It tells us that we should, generally speaking, rest only as much as we need to in order to work.”
With Us Now and til the End
“Do you believe Jesus is with you? Or is he standing off in the heavens, waiting to join the glorified you at the end of the age?” Do you believe he’s with you when you suffer? When you sin?
Flashback: Whatever Is False, Whatever Is Immoral, Whatever Is Prejudiced…
We must deliberately discipline ourselves to consider only what honors God, only what is pleasing to him, only what results in his sweet peace.

You are not to rest partly on Christ, -partly on doing all you can, -partly on keeping your Church, -partly on receiving the sacrament. In the matter of your justification Christ is to be all. —J.C. Ryle

I once heard of a ship that was crossing the Atlantic from Europe to South America, and as it neared the end of its crossing, it escaped a close call that would have sent it to the depths and would have taken the lives of many of its passengers.
After departing Dover, the ship had cruised for many days without incident and without mishap. In fact, the crossing had been so smooth and so unremarkable that the crew began to grow lax in their duties. As the ship drew close to the South American coast, the man on lookout nodded off, and as he slept his ship began to approach a particularly rocky and ruinous spot.
But as it happened, there was a cricket aboard that ship. Until that point in the journey, no one had noticed its presence, but as the ship drew close to land, the cricket somehow smelled it or sensed it, and set up a shrill call. The lookout awoke, understood that land was quickly approaching, and stopped the vessel before it blundered into the rocks and was lost.
In this case, something as insignificant as the chirping of a cricket saved many lives. And I sometimes wonder what you and I may accomplish with what seems to be the simplest and least significant of sounds. I wonder what heaven will someday reveal—what we will hear in the soundtrack of heaven.
Maybe the scratching of a pen on a notecard will prove to be the means God used to encourage one of his downcast people and strengthen them for another day of love and service.
Maybe the tapping of a keyboard that sounds the writing of an article or email will be shown to have introduced a skeptic to the gospel and won a sinner to salvation.
Maybe the clank of a spoon stirring a pot will eventually be seen to have been used to feed one of God’s “angels unaware”—to have displayed a distinctly Christian commitment to love and hospitality.
God is the master of transforming the ordinary to the extraordinary, the mundane to the miraculous.Share
Maybe it’s the click of knitting needles as they create a sweater to clothe one who is cold, the crunch of footsteps in the snow as they approach a home for a time of prayer, the sound of a sob as one Christian weeps with another, sharing a heavy burden and so fulfilling the law of Christ. Maybe it’s even the sound of a bell ringing from a church steeple and calling people to turn to Christ that day, that hour, that minute.
God is the master of transforming the ordinary into the extraordinary, the mundane into the miraculous. God is the master of accepting little and multiplying it to much. God is the master of taking our little contributions and making them the great means through which he blesses his people and brings glory to his name. And I am convinced we will one day learn that the soundtrack of heaven is made up of the simplest of sounds that God has joined together into the most stirring of symphonies.