As I share this update I am just setting off to begin the project I have titled Worship Round the World. The premise of Worship Round the World is that I will visit 12 different churches in 12 very different places to get to know those congregations and to join them for a Sunday service. Each of these churches will worship in a way that is consistent with Scripture, yet also faithful to the local language, customs, and culture. In this way each worship service will be unique yet distinctly biblical. I will be making the journey with my friend Tim Keesee.

This was a project I dreamed up a few years ago and fundraised for in 2019. I had intended to set out in 2020, but then the world slammed shut because of the pandemic and is only now getting back anywhere near to normal. If all goes well, the great majority of the travel will take place by the end of this year. In 2024 we will produce a book and video series based on all we saw and experienced. Our great hope is that it will encourage us all to praise God for what he is doing each and every Sunday as his people gather together to join in a worldwide chorus of praise to his name.
While we very nearly reached our fundraising goal in 2019, travel costs have increased substantially since then and we know we will fall short. If that sounds like something that would interest you, you can make a tax-deductible donation to the project through Frontline Missions. (Click and then scroll to the bottom of that page.)
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In other news, I have a new site design that will be launching in the days ahead. This is a huge project that has been underway for some time now. When it launches you will quickly see that things look a lot different, but I hope you’ll also find that things function better. I’m sure there will be some initial bugs and errors, so please just bear with me through those. I’ll have more to say about this project soon.
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Last month I undertook what I think may prove one of the most difficult things I have ever done: I changed my keyboard layout. I learned to type, as you did, on a keyboard with a standard QWERTY layout. In fact, I learned on an actual manual typewriter back in ninth grade, the teacher tapping a yardstick while together we rhythmically chanted (and typed) “A … S … D … F … G … H … J … K … L … semi.” I learned well and have been able to type at nearly 100 words per minute ever since with almost perfect accuracy. Yet it is now well-known that while the QWERTY layout may have made sense for typewriters it doesn’t make as much sense for computers. And it has the unfortunate problem of putting the most-used keys in some of the most awkward spots—spots that often require stretching the weakest fingers. I deal with significant pain when typing and, having exhausted most other solutions, decided it was time to take this radical step. 
I researched the different options and landed on Colemak (in the “DH” variant for those who follow such things). It has been extremely difficult to overcome 30+ years of muscle memory but bit-by-bit I am getting it and my typing speed and accuracy are slowly recovering. I expect it will be ages before I am back to my old speeds, but I am, at least, getting closer to being able to type at the speed of my thoughts. I am also correcting some bad typing habits and forcing myself to strike the right keys with the right fingers.
I probably didn’t help my cause a lot by also changing to a new keyboard at the same time. I picked up the strangely-named and strangely-shaped Moonlander which offers some very helpful functions, such as a way to eliminate the shift keys (thus mitigating a lot of wear and tear on pinky fingers). Anyway, the whole process has been extremely difficult and frustrating, but I am hopeful the results will be good in the end—and that eventually my brain will clue in to where the “d” key now is, since that’s the one that continues to torment me the most.
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As for the family, all is well, I think. Abby is into the second semester of her junior year at Boyce College while her husband Nate is working full time and taking classes online through The Master’s University as he works toward finishing up his degree in business. Michaela is pressing on in her final year of high school and looking forward to beginning at Boyce in August. Ryn is working full time at a coffee shop in Louisville while also auditing some classes at Southern Seminary. Aileen is still enjoying her job as a personal assistant for a neighbor who works in real estate. The Lord continues to bless us in so many ways and we continue to wish only that we might honor and serve him.

May the Lord be with you and bless you today.

Westminster Books has a sale on some of the new and notable books released this winter.
Consider Suffering Joy?
This is a helpful take on the Biblical directive that we find joy even in suffering.
William Borden, “The Millionaire Missionary”
I always love considering the story of young William Borden’s life. “Borden’s tremendous wealth did not deflect him in the least from his whole-hearted consecration to Jesus. Instead, he remained wholly devoted to serving Christ and His Kingdom with his time, talents, energy, intellect and treasure.”
A Brief Guide to Disciple Making Movements (DMM)
There is a missions methodology that has caught the imagination of sending agencies, churches, and missions candidates throughout the world. The influence of this movement among sending organizations supporting this methodology seems nearly ubiquitous. This missions methodology is called “Disciple Making Movements”. (Sponsored Link)
When You Don’t Feel Like Having Sex with Your Spouse
Lauren Washer: “Like many Christian girls raised in the 1990s under ‘True Love Waits’ campaigns, I was fiercely committed to remaining a virgin until my wedding night. But I was also convinced sex would be a daily—and delightful—part of married life. If sex had been built up by so many as an experience well worth the wait then it must be amazing. I was right and wrong. Married sex is wonderful. But it’s also far more complicated than I ever imagined.”
How Can We Make Decisions and Know God’s Will?
“When I completed seminary and first began pastoring, I expected the pastorate to be composed predominately with preaching, theological discussions, and hospital visits. One area of ministry I was grossly unprepared for was helping Christians make decisions.”
He doesn’t want your hand, He wants your heart
This is a call to take sin seriously.
Dear Small Church: A Word of Encouragement
Here’s some encouragement for pastors of smaller churches.
Flashback: Has the Bible Been Preserved For Us Today?
How can we be sure that God’s Word has remained God’s Word from the time it was first written to this present day?

Confessing to God brings us face to face with the one who knows us fully, yet forgives us completely. —Garrett Kell

Blessings to you today.

Christianbook.com is having a Mid-Winter Sale and has lots of good products discounted (e.g. Paul Tripp’s New Morning Mercies; Tim Keller’s The Freedom of Self-Forgetfulness and new biography; John Piper’s Come, Lord Jesus; Lutzer’s We Will Not Be Silenced and We Will Not Hide; CSB Study Bible; etc.
And yes, there are a few new Kindle deals.
(Yesterday on the blog: Why Modern Dating Is So Difficult)
3 Surprising Agreements Pastors Must Make
This is such a good article from Jared Wilson. “Beginning pastors aren’t often prepared for these unspoken agreements. Veteran pastors still struggle with them. But there are a number of ‘job hazards’ that come with the pastoral territory for which every minister should be aware and to which every minister should adjust. Here are just three…”
How would you explain the doctrine of limited atonement to an Arminian?
Stephen Nichols does a good job of explaining the Calvinistic “L” here.
Join John MacArthur, Costi Hinn, Brooks Buser, Ian Hamilton, Aubrey Sequeira, and Others at The Radius Conference
June 28-29, 2023 @ Grace Community Church in Sun Valley, CA.  TRC is for pastors, aspiring missionaries, and anyone interested in biblical missiology. (Sponsored Link)
Where Did Baptists Come From?
“The question of the origins of the Christian tradition called Baptist has been, and to some extent still is, a much-debated issue.” Michael Haykin offers some clarity.
Having All Things In Common
“We shouldn’t see this as some early form of communism. This wasn’t the church taking charge of the wealth of the many, but rather this was voluntary, temporary and was limited in its scope. As we continue through Acts and the letters of Paul we see that the need of the church went beyond these early meetings and would be filled by other churches as they were planted and grew.”
“Now we’re on the gospel!”
I love this: “I wish I had been there to see this one. Here’s the scene: An elderly Christian woman is speaking with college girls at a campout. Conversation is going, then the subject turns to Christ. She lights up, pumps her fist, and says, ‘Now we’re on the gospel!’ She loved that they were going to talk about Jesus.”
Flashback: The Music of Heaven
There is a  sense in which our worship extends far beyond the four walls of our little building and reaches to the very gates of heaven.

Any hurried goodbye may be for years, and perhaps final; surely then it should be loving. —J.R. Miller

One matter that constantly perplexes me is just how difficult it is for young Christians today to figure out dating and romantic relationships. What was quite straightforward in my day seems to have become much more complicated in these days. But as I study the cultural ethos, it begins to make sense, for in my day the cultural assumptions and the Christian assumptions were quite similar. Today, though, they are worlds apart. Paul Grimmond expresses this helpfully in his book Water for My Camels. He lays out seven features of our modern Western context that impact dating in profound ways.

Marriage is simply a social construct. In the past few decades there has been a seismic shift in society’s understanding of marriage. Once understood to have originated in the mind of God as a component of his design for humanity, marriage is now believed to be a human-created social construct (and, in many minds, one designed as a tool of oppression). “Modern Western societies have essentially rejected the idea that God created and designed marriage, and that he therefore defines what it is and what it’s for. Instead, we now take the view that marriage is a social construct. That is, it’s seen as a human institution: we invented it, and we can therefore change it to be whatever we say it is.”
Sex is just an appetite. Where sex was formerly understood to belong within the institution of marriage and to be bound inexorably to procreation and marriage’s unique relational intimacy, today it is commonly regarded as merely a biological appetite. “If you’re hungry, find something to eat. If you’re thirsty, find something to drink. If you feel sexual drive, go and do something about it. And if sex is defined as an appetite, it’s only a short step further to say that sex is virtually morally irrelevant. We feel no shame or guilt for eating when we’re hungry or drinking when we’re thirsty, so why attach any morality to any sexual practices that flow from our sexual appetites?” Sex has been downgraded from something that is exceedingly precious to something that is just a meaningless bodily function.
Sex and dating are synonymous. The assumption today is that couples who date are having sex with one another. Hence where dating was once a means to an end—marriage and the sexual relationship within it—, today it is an end in and of itself. “This fusion of sex and dating is the cultural air that we breathe. But it’s a new innovation. This is the first time in human history that a society has joined these two things together. Sure, it may have happened on a private, individual level, but it was not the cultural expectation. Today, dating but not having sex is decidedly weird.”
Smartphones are great for relationships. “It’s hard to overstate the way smartphones have changed our lives—especially the lives of teenagers and some young adults who have never known a world without them. Among all the changes that these devices have brought, the smartphone has radically changed the dating experience in ways that you cannot comprehend if you’re under the age of 25.” Couples are no longer ever separate from one another, but always bound together by their devices. This means a dating relationship is constant and follows them everywhere. Not only that, but it often takes place through a private medium and in private or intimate spaces (e.g. late at night in bedrooms). It is hard to believe that this is always, or even often, a healthy dynamic.
Pornography is just harmless fun. While pornography has always existed in one form or another, it has certainly never been as prevalent and as accepted as it is today. It would be rare today to encounter a couple for whom it has not been a significant part of at least one of their lives. This is nearly as true for Christians as for unbelievers. “This is the only world that today’s teenagers know. The vast majority of teenagers and young adults have some kind of experience with pornography. Even if, by the grace of God, you’ve avoided any form of pornography, you’ve still grown up in a world that thinks of pornography as normal, a bit of ‘harmless fun’, when it is anything but normal, harmless or fun.” 
Choice is king. While Western culture is rampantly individualistic, we are unlikely to see or understand how unusual this is. Everything in our lives is a matter of choice and choice is the way in which we express our individuality. This impacts dating in a key way: “We have reached a point in history where, for most people, dating is a choice to be made independently of your social sphere; independently of your parents and your wider family.” Not only that, but our culture of individualism convinces us that we should evaluate relationships primarily through the lens of what that relationship does for me and how it makes me feel. This, of course, contrasts the biblical emphasis on looking outward to love and serve others.
If marriage doesn’t work, just end it. The era of no-fault divorce has made marriage function as a relationship of convenience that can be easily terminated when it is no longer enjoyable, no longer fulfilling, or just plain difficult. “No-fault divorce was part and parcel of a worldview that saw marriage as a human institution that the state was free to redefine. At that level, no-fault divorce represents a belief that marriage is not permanent. For most people living in the world around us, marriage is seen as something that creates stability (which is why so many couples still get married when they have children) and offers a powerful declaration of two people’s love for each other at that moment. But fundamentally, we live in a world where divorce is the solution for marriages that don’t work. Put bluntly, marriage is temporary for anyone who wants it to be temporary.”
Though these are secular ways of thinking about dating, marriage, sex, and relationships, they are so deeply ingrained in the culture that even Christians are impacted by them. They are such a part of the culture around us (and, sadly, within us) that it takes time, thought, and effort to identify and counter them—a key task for Christian leaders in the days to come.

Grace and peace to you today.

Theres’s a good number of Kindle deals today.
(Yesterday on the blog: Hoping For Heaven or Wallowing in This World)
On twirling spears
What is spear twirling? “You know how it is: that argument you have as you look in the mirror brushing your teeth, or shaving… the argument where you are rehearsing just what you would like to say to that person at work, or at church, or in the next room!… the argument you always win, but actually will never say.”
Just Listen
“After a few years of reaching out to these younger women, it finally dawned on me that they weren’t interested in my wisdom or advice. They weren’t even all that interested in getting to know me. What they wanted instead was just someone to listen to them.” And that can be its own gift.
The Gray Havens – “Come Behold the Wondrous Mystery” (Official Audio)
This is a lovely rendition of “Come Behold the Wondrous Mystery” by The Gray Havens. They are about to begin a new tour. If you plan to go, use coupon code Challies5 to save $5 per ticket.
Some Thoughts on the Asbury Revival
“Perhaps you have heard or read by now reports about a revival taking place on the campus of Asbury University in Wilmore, Kentucky. A campus chapel service on Wednesday did not end at its appointed time but rather carried on for days on end. Students lingered and prayed and repented and worshipped.” Denny Burk offers some thoughts on it.
And a Soft Tongue Will Break a Bone
Here is a good example of a time when a soft tongue made all the difference.
Sinners or Saints — How Should We Speak of Christians?
“I was recently challenged about my use of the word sinner to collectively speak of God’s people. Can we who are saved by grace through faith still be called sinners, or is it more biblical to use the word saint?” John Piper answers the question.
Flashback: Biographies for People Who Have Never Read a Biography
Today I want to offer just a few suggestions and recommendations for people who are approaching biography for the first time, or for the first time in a long while.

We must have cast our sins on Him before we can cast our cares. We must be at peace with God through the work of our Saviour before we can have the peace of God through faith in His gracious interposition on our behalf. —F.B. Meyer

I suppose nearly everyone holds out some kind of hope for some kind of heaven. The reality, though, is that few truly long for the heaven the Bible describes. Richard Sibbes considers this fact in an excerpt drawn from a new daily devotional collection titled Refreshment for the Soul, published recently by Banner of Truth. The devotional is based on 1 John 3:3: “And everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure.”

It is impossible for a man, if he be not truly renewed, to desire heaven. He may wish for it under the notion of a kingdom, a pleasure, or the like. But as heaven containing a state of perfect holiness and freedom from sin, he cares not for it. A man that is out of relish with heavenly things, and can taste only his worldly sins, cannot relish heaven itself. His own heart tells him, I would rather have this world’s pleasure and honour than to have those of heaven. Swine love mud better than a garden. They are in their element in these things. Take a swinish, worldly person, he loves to wallow in this world. Tell him of heaven, he has no desire for it.
Yet, there are none of us, but we desire, at least we pretend that we desire, heaven; but most men conceive it only as a place free from trouble and annoyance. But except you have a holy, gracious heart, and desire heaven that you may be free from sin, and have communion with Christ and his saints, to have the image of God, the divine nature perfect in you; you are a hypocrite and you carry a presumptuous conception of these things. Your hope will delude you; it is a false hope. “Everyone that has this hope purifies himself” (I John 3:3). Everyone, he excludes none. Do you defile yourself, and live in a sinful way, and have you this hope? You have a hope, but it is not this hope; for everyone that has this hope purifies himself. Even the greatest man living, if he be a sinful man, is frightened by death, “the king of fears.” He thinks, “I may have some trouble in this world, but there is worse to come”; things that he is not able to conceive of. 
Let us not therefore delude ourselves. There is nothing that will bring confidence but being a new creation in Christ. Then we may without presumption hope for the good things “that neither eye has seen, nor ear heard, neither has entered into the heart of man” (1 Cor. 2:9).

My gratitude goes to TGC for sponsoring the blog this week to tell you about Collin Hansen’s new book.

Today’s Kindle deals include a nice little list.
(Yesterday on the blog: Jinger Vuolo’s Story of Disentangling Faith from Fear)
What Can Death Do to Us?
Randy Alcorn: “‘To die will be an awfully big adventure,’ says Peter Pan. But it will be a wonderful, big adventure only for those who are covered by the blood of Christ. Those who die without Jesus will experience a horrifying tragedy. Of course, dying is not the real adventure. Death is merely the doorway to eternal life.”
5 Myths about Porn
“Porn promises much but delivers less—and not just less but, in fact, the opposite of what it promises. And by now aren’t we all fed up with being manipulated? Advertisers lie to us. Politicians lie to us. Porn lies to us. This world breaks our hearts. But Jesus has come, and his kingdom heals our hearts. So let’s be defiant. Let’s get free of every lie, by God’s grace, starting with the fraudulence that pornography is.”
Friendships Are Worth the Risk
Eleanor Kwizera wants you to know that friendships, though risky, are worth it. “Thumbing on my phone through Instagram stories I pause on a trending video. It’s a lady, ranting about adult friendships, about how no one prepares you for the pain that comes with losing friends.”
Aging for God’s Glory
For kids, birthdays are awfully exciting. “When you’re an adult, however, birthdays become drastically less exciting. Instead of birthdays marking the dawn of new experiences and abilities, they tend to bring a loss of ability and remind you of past moments you will never again experience.”
Do the Synoptic Gospels Portray Jesus as God? Rethinking Jesus Walking on the Water
“If I’ve heard it once, I’ve heard it a thousand times. It’s the idea that John presents Jesus as divine and the Synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke) present Jesus as a mere man. And when you combine all the Gospels together, only then do you end up with a vision of Jesus as both God and man.” Michael Kruger responds.
The Great Deception
“I have been told that my first sentence was this: I do it. My baby voice is on an old tape, collecting dust somewhere, a cassette I recall hearing many years ago. At the time of the recording I was not yet one-and-a-half. As my parents were trying to help me with something, I responded with: I do it. Even now I prefer little help.”
Flashback: Waiting with Faith
Wisdom gently whispers there is an Author telling a story whose end will be as wonderful as its beginning, whose final chapter will be as breathtaking as its first.

If you are Christians, be consistent. Be Christians out and out; Christians every hour, in every part. —Horatius Bonar

I suppose I should probably preface what follows by saying that I have never watched as much as a moment of any show by or about the Duggar family. I once had a very cordial chat with Jinger Vuolo (formerly Duggar) at a conference without knowing she was a reality TV personality and probably the best-known person at the whole event. Such is my knowledge of television! And so when I chose to buy and read her new memoir Becoming Free Indeed it was not because I am a fan of her family or heavily invested in her story, but because from the bit I had heard of it, it would powerfully contrast some other recent memoirs. I’ll explain that as I go.

But first, for those who are as ignorant as I am, Jinger Vuolo is one of the 19 children born to Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar. For many years the lives of the Duggar family were broadcast on the TLC shows 19 Kids and Counting and Counting On. This put Jinger and her family squarely in the public eye and gave them a forum to showcase their Christian faith and values. Yet these values were closely tied to the troubling ministry of Bill Gothard.
For many years Gothard had a near cult-like following and exercised tremendous power over many of those who relied on his interpretation of the Bible—including the Duggars. Yet what he taught was only ever loosely drawn from Scripture and always extremely legalistic. As suggested by the book’s subtitle, he kept people in a state of spiritual fear and uncertainty. His ministry exploded a few years ago when a whole series of women credibly accused him of sexual harassment and assault.
Vuolo’s book is essentially the story of her coming to terms with the form of Christianity she experienced in her childhood and her growing awareness of its many shortcomings. But it is also her account of discovering a form of Christianity that is much more consistent with the Bible and much more satisfying. And what I described in the last sentence is precisely why I read her memoir.
We can turn to any number of books to find stories of people who were raised in Christian contexts that were either marked by theological error or moral scandal. Many of these books tell of the author ultimately abandoning her faith. Such tales of deconstruction are all the rage and often sell in vast quantities. And a good number of them are written by people who were raised in contexts much more innocuous than Gothardism. It wouldn’t have been shocking if Vuolo’s memoir had been of that kind.
But thankfully it is not. Rather than describing someone abandoning her faith, Becoming Free Indeed describes someone persistently searching the Scriptures to refine her faith. Rather than describing someone walking away from God, it describes someone drawing closer to him. It provides a powerful contrast to those who chose to revoke their faith by telling of someone who chose to not only remain a Christian, but to grow in her confidence in the Lord and to follow him with even greater passion and commitment.
It tells all of this in the form of a memoir that is interesting on a human-interest level and encouraging on a spiritual level. It tells all to this while protecting confidentiality and respecting parents and family. It tells all of this in a book that I rather enjoyed and gladly commend.

The grace of the Lord Jesus be with you today.

Westminster Books has deals on a number of interesting books, including that new one about Tim Keller.
Not a Dinosaur
Mitch Chase: “Among the speakers in the book of Job, the Lord gives the final speech (in chs. 38–41). And the last thing he speaks about is Leviathan. What is Leviathan? Are there clues in the text or outside of the book that help us identify it? Let’s see what we see.” He has an interesting perspective on it.
The Faith Crisis of Francis Schaeffer
This interesting article discusses the existence, cause, and effect of Francis Schaeffer’s crisis of faith.
Not Enough of Me to Go Around
“She stands before me with eager eyes, just wanting her mommy to do one simple thing. Hand extended, she displays the hair tie. But I can’t help her. Not right now. And so I have begun to teach my sweet ones a new saying: ‘My mommy loves me. She will help me when she can.’ A simple truth, but not an easy one.”
Why do Christians address sexuality and gender issues all the time?
“A common refrain among many outside the church is that Christians seem obsessed with talking about sexuality and gender issues. Often, this is mocked or simply dismissed as Christians just seeking to enforce their personal views on other people or to impose our beliefs through government action.” Jason Thacker responds to the charge.
Deliverance Hits the Big Screen
“For those who may not know, a deliverance film will be released next month in two thousand movie theaters across the United States.” “Lovesick Scribe” tells what it’s about and why we should be concerned.
How can we trust the Bible when there are so many contradictions?
“This may be your question. Or the question of someone you know. It’s a good question to ask.However, the question automatically assumes that there are many contradictions in the Bible, and that the Bible isn’t reliable. And so actually before going further, it’s worth asking these three questions…”
Flashback: Should Young Pastors Prefer a Large or Small Church?
In a small church a pastor will be able to get to know—to really know—his people and the value of each and every soul. Where in a big city church he may preach to anonymous masses, in a small country church he will preach to well-known individuals.

There is no point in praying for victory over temptation if we are not willing to make a commitment to say no to it. —Jerry Bridges