Westminster Books is offering a deal on the 31-Day Devotional for Life series which has a new volume on depression written by Ed Welch. It’s a very good series that has now grown to 26 volumes spanning many different subjects. Don’t forget WTS also has Paul Tripp’s new devotional Everyday Gospel on sale. It comes as a standalone or integrated into an ESV Bible.
Today’s Kindle deals include some excellent titles: Gun Lap by Robert Wolgemuth is timely; He Will Be Enough by Katie Faris is comforting; Love Like You Mean it by Bob Lepine is challenging.
(Yesterday on the blog: John Mark Comer and Practicing The Way)

I found lots of interesting takeaways from this article about Mark Dever’s 30 years (so far) at Capitol Hill Baptist Church.

Sports betting has become huge business and lots of Christians are being tempted or drawn in. This article from DG asks whether Christians should participate. While you won’t be surprised by the answer, I think you’ll be helped by some of the reasoning.

Michael Kruger looks to early Christians to help us learn how to live in a hostile culture.

Aaron Armstrong: “When a person’s sin is exposed, it is simultaneously tragic and a good thing. The tragic aspect is that evil of any sort has been perpetrated. People have been hurt. Trust has been violated. Harm has been done. Sin is never victimless because it doesn’t exist in a vacuum, something we’re reminded of every time the sin of a Christian with any degree of notoriety is exposed.”

Al Mohler recently spoke about the downfall of a popular preacher. Since he chose not to name that individual, I am doing the same. Mohler’s comments are helpful and challenging.

Wayne Grudem answers a common question: Does Leviticus 19 prohibit Christians from getting tattoos?

There is little intrinsic value in gaming. For most of us it is merely entertainment. But that doesn’t make it wrong.

When the time comes for you to die, you need not be afraid, because death cannot separate you from God’s love.
—C.H. Spurgeon

May the Lord bless and keep you this weekend as you serve him and delight in him.

As usual, there are some Kindle deals to look at.
(Yesterday on the blog: If You Could Go Back To Any Moment In Time…)
Even To Old Age and Gray Hairs
William Farley shares some thoughts on grandparenting. “Today’s influential grandparent recognizes that they face challenges previous generations did not. Old age is not respected, families are shrinking, and the desire to flee to permanent vacation tempts those with the resources.”
The Preaching Class with John Piper
“John Piper—co-founder of Desiring God, former preaching pastor at Bethlehem Baptist Church, and author of The Supremacy of God in Preaching and Expository Exultation: Christian Preaching as Worship—has recorded 19 mini-lectures on preaching (about 10 minutes each, for a total of about four hours). This is then followed by a two-and-a-half hour workshop where Piper is joined by three younger local preaching pastors to talk through various issues.”
Inviting Afghan Refugees Over for Dinner
While Afghan refugees are on so many minds, this may be a good time to read about ways to extend hospitality to people from the Middle East and Central Asia. “Statistically, most of these refugees will never be invited into a Westerner’s home for tea, dinner, or for a holiday. Imagine the powerful kindness, then, felt by a new refugee family who experiences an exception and is welcomed into your home – and the format of the evening is even somewhat familiar for them.”
Breaching the Weismann barrier
“A cardinal rule in biology is that the body cells and reproductive cells are separate in higher organisms.This is called the Weismann barrier, after famous German evolutionist August Weismann who discovered it. It was he who first realized the difference between the reproductive cells and the body cells in higher organisms.” In this article (and video) Robert Carter explains how the barrier has been breached and what it means.
Do You Believe in Magic? Magic for Americans
Dave Hare finishes us an interesting look at magic as understand in an American and African context. “The greatest danger for Americans today is that we are tempted to act as though the spiritual does not exist. We are tempted to live as though people are our enemies. We are tempted to drug ourselves into ignoring the attacks of the Devil.”
Making Our Gardens Grow
Janie B. Cheaney: “Gardening is more than sweet resignation, though. It’s the creation mandate at ground level while rejoicing in (and struggling with) sun, soil, wind, and rain. It’s the wonder of a tiny, mighty seed and being front-row witnesses to our God’s prodigal abundance.”
Give Me Nineteen Men
“Where are we in missions to the Muslim world on this twentieth anniversary of 9/11? If we look only at surface realities, we may easily lose hope.” Mack Stiles tells us why we need not and must not lose hope.
Flashback: The Greatest Burden of Leadership
The burden of responsibility is light compared to the burden of insufficiency, inability, or just plain failure.

The clear message from Genesis to Revelation is either go to hell with your own righteousness, or go to heaven with the righteousness of Christ credited to your account by faith alone. Faith in Christ is saving; faith in anything or anyone else is superstition. —Michael Horton

May God bless you as you serve and worship him this weekend.

There are some new Kindle deals to browse through.
(Yesterday on the blog: Is It Unspiritual To Be Depressed?)
Can Christians ‘Do Business’ with the World?
“In recent decades, a number of prominent Christian organizations and denominations have called for Christians to boycott businesses that are associated in some way with non-Christian ethics.” This article asks whether this is necessary.
Did We Kiss Purity Goodbye?
There are some interesting reflections here on the successes and failures of purity culture. “Calls for sexual purity were (and are) biblical and needed. Even in the midst of the good that was done through lots of preaching and discipleship during those years, several lies seemed to spread in the renewed emphasis on purity — each laced with enough truth to be taken seriously and yet with enough deceit to lead some astray.”
4 Traits of an Emotionally Healthy Ministry Worker
Eliza Huie affirms the importance of spiritual health but says “spiritual vitality is not the only area of health ministry workers need to pursue. Your emotional health is also essential. Below are four traits of emotionally healthy people for you to pursue. If you’re in ministry, each one is worthy of your careful consideration.”
Chasing Sunsets
“Why did God give us sunsets? He could have made the shift from light to dark an instantaneous change. One moment it’s day, the next it’s night. One moment you can see, the next you can’t. But written into creation is a gradual movement in colors that hurts our eyes with brilliance and bends our brains with wonder every single day that we care to pause and notice.” Glenna Marshall marvels at God’s handiwork.
The 3 Motivations to Work
“There tend to be three primary motivations that drive people to accomplish something, but it is not until we reach the third that we are nearing maturity.”
God Sees the Pain Unseen by Others
“At a moment’s notice, chaos could erupt in our home. But it never failed that our most difficult moments with our child’s challenges often occurred on the mornings I was determined to make it to my bible study. And this particular morning was no different.” Sarah Walton writes about a special moment.
Flashback: The Opposite of Envy
Neither someone else’s success nor our lack of success changes who we are in Christ. Neither some else’s failures nor our own has any bearing on who we are in him.

It will not take long for God to make up to you in the next world for all you have suffered in this. —De Witt Talmage