A classic strategy in times of warfare is to dehumanize the enemy. No sooner has a conflict broken out than the two sides begin to refer to one another as animals rather than men, as mere creatures rather than human beings. It is difficult to harm another person and abnormal to kill one. Our humanity naturally rebels against it. But the challenge becomes easier when the enemy soldier is an animal instead of a man. After all, it is human beings rather than animals who have particular rights and dignities.

Similarly, a classic strategy in times of church conflict or theological debate is to demean the person who believes what you do not. Even if you do not quite regard the other person as an animal, you can regard him as a heretic or an enemy of the faith, as something other than a Christian. If the strategy of military leaders is to make their soldiers regard the enemy as less than human, the strategy of many believers is to regard their theological enemies as less than Christian. After all, the Bible provides clear instructions about the love, respect, and honor we owe to our fellow Christians. We permit ourselves to circumvent such instructions when the other person is an apostate or unbeliever.
In times of conflict or debate among those who profess the Christian faith, it is crucial to relate to others rightly. It is crucial to bear in mind who this person is and how God calls us to relate to him.
We need to bear in mind that this person is a human being. He has been created by God in the image of God and deserves all the dignity that comes with this highest of honors. God made man a little lower than the angels but much higher than any other created being. Of man alone he said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.” To man alone he gave the creation mandate and dominion over this earth. God regarded man as a special creature and one of special worth. Surely we ought to do the same.
And then we must also consider that this person is God’s child. Not only has he been created by God in the image of God, but he has been saved by Jesus Christ and is being re-created in his image. He was loved by God before the ages began, saved by God when Christ died for his sins, and indwelled by God when he was filled with the Holy Spirit. He has been adopted into God’s family and rightly considers God his Father. He is no longer under the dominion of Satan but is within the family of God—he is a precious child of our Heavenly Father.
That being the case, we need to also consider that this person is a brother. He is not a brother in a casual sense as if we are members of the same fan club or enthusiasts of the same hobby. He is a brother in a sense that is even more profound and longer-lasting than biology. We have the same Father and are therefore members of the same family—a family that has been called out of all humanity to be loved by God and to display the glory of God. The love, loyalty, and honor we owe to him is that of a brother to a brother.
And then we also need to consider that we will be in relationship with one another for all of eternity. The relationship we have now will continue past death and into endless life beyond. Of course it will be perfected and all will be reconciled and forgiven when we pass from earth to heaven. But there is a long and glorious future between us, a future in which we will live together forever, brothers who have been justified and glorified. God’s calling on all of us is to enact that relationship now, to begin to live on earth as if we were in heaven, to demonstrate heavenly virtues during our earthly lives.
And so in times of disagreement and times of debate, we must be careful to relate to one another in the ways God commands. We owe it to them and we owe it to Him to afford one another all the patience a human being deserves, all the dignity a child of God deserves, all the respect a brother deserves, and all the love deserved by a friend with whom we will spend all of eternity.

Thirty percent of families in the US are led by a single parent. Nearly nineteen million children have just one parent in their home. And while the actual numbers will vary from nation to nation, most of the Western world experiences something similar—large numbers of families that are led by just one parent. Sometimes the cause is divorce, sometimes death, sometimes unplanned pregnancy, and sometimes any number of other factors. But the reality is that more people than ever are raising families alone.

God’s Grace for Every Family

And this makes me wonder: Are our churches a safe and attractive place for such families? Do we welcome them and make them feel accepted? Do we account for them in our ministries, in our programs, in our sermon application? Do we acknowledge that single-parent families not only exist, but form a significant part of the population? Do we truly value them?
It was these questions that compelled me to read Anna Meade Harris’ new book God’s Grace for Every Family: Biblical Encouragement for Single-Parent Families and the Churches That Seek to Love Them Well. Though I do not have experience in being part of a single-parent family, I do serve a church that has included a good number of them. And I have wondered if we have served them well. Her book is meant to provide comfort and counsel to single parents while also informing and training churches to love them well.
Harris became a single parent in 2010 after her husband succumbed to colon cancer. At that time, their boys were nine, twelve, and thirteen years of age. And she was left to finish raising those boys and to press on in life without her spouse, her partner in so many of life’s blessings and challenges.
“In these pages,” she says, “I celebrate what my boys and I learned about the steadfast love of God for single parents and their children and invite the rest of the church to witness his grace made visible in our families. But before I could appreciate God’s grace for myself, I had to discover how limited and needy I truly am.” In other words, she had to come to terms with her own “not-enoughness.” She had to admit her need and inability. This introduces a section of the book that functions like a kind of guided tour of the particular challenges of single parenting. She writes about fear, grief, exhaustion, loneliness, vulnerability, uncertainty, shame, and pride. Though each of these may exist among any of us, they can be especially pronounced in those who are parenting alone.
Later, each of these factors receives a chapter-length treatment. A few stood out to me. Her chapter on fear explains why single parents may bear an extra measure of fear as they not only grapple with some form of loss, but also as they consider raising children without a second, complementary parent. Her chapter on exhaustion helped me understand how a church’s programs are often built around the capabilities of a two-parent home in which responsibilities are divided between a father and mother and in which someone else is often available to care for the children. 
Her chapter on vulnerability helped me better appreciate how single moms are often especially vulnerable in any number of ways and often carry that sense of vulnerability with them throughout life. And her chapter on shame helped me understand how churches can inadvertently increase the sense of shame that so many single parents carry, even when the circumstances that led to being single are in no way their fault. These lessons and so many more have helped me better understand, better appreciate the challenges, and, I trust, better love those who are living them out.
“Single parents want nothing more than to love their children, to provide and protect, to see them heal and thrive, but doing that alone seems virtually impossible. At times, that impossibility threatens to break our hearts.” The hope and confidence in this book is that the challenges of doing all this alone can be met within the church where God’s family can step up, care, love, and provide. The church is meant to be a place where the fatherless can find a father figure and the motherless a mother figure, a place where many brothers will reach out to assist a needy sister and many sisters will reach out to assist a needy brother. It is, in short, a place where God means to bless every family—even, and perhaps especially, those families who are most broken and most in need of his grace.

May the Lord be with you and bless you today.

(Yesterday on the blog: What a Wonder Is a Human Being!)
Did Jesus Tell Us to Give to Every Panhandler?
I think John Piper does a good job of answering this. “At the last judgment — I’ve thought about this many times — I think Jesus will be much more prone to commend lavish generosity to the undeserving than he will be to commend how shrewd we were in keeping for ourselves our few dollars rather than giving them away. I just can’t imagine Jesus saying, ‘Wow, you were especially good at being shrewd at not being taken advantage of.’ I don’t hear anything like that in Jesus’s teachings.”
When Technology Harms Discipleship
“Years ago before social media, televangelists and online ministries people would walk to a pastor’s home for advice. If they didn’t think it was such a serious matter they’d share with a friend or a few in the fellowship. But life has changed. We now live on one end of the city and go to church on the other side. Our favourite men of God live in a different continent from us. We send our prayers across the seas with a small gift to make sure they are answered. And anonymity means we can share very personal issues to strangers and get advice from people removed from our local context.”
Win Free Admission for Two: 2023 Ligonier National Conference
Ligonier Ministries is offering free admission to ten pairs of winners at their 2023 National Conference, Stand Firm. Taking place in Orlando, FL, on March 23–25, 2023, this conference will encourage Christians to live courageously and without compromise amid changing times, finding stability in the eternal truth of God’s Word. Enter the giveaway today for the possibility of being randomly selected to win free entry for two people.
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Why Washed in the Blood of Christ is Better Than in my Washing Machine
This article helpfully compares one kind of washing with another.
3 Steps to Examining Your Faith
Here are some helps to obeying in the Bible’s admonitions that we examine our faith.
Who Knew When We Said “I do?”
How many of us really know what we’re doing when we say “I do?”
Was Jesus in the Grave for Three Days?
Lots of people have wondered why there appears to be a contradiction here.
Flashback: My Great Daily Challenge As a Christian
Why do I fail to live the way I want to live, the way God tells me to live, the way God enables and equips me to live? What is the great daily challenge?

I had rather die a Covenant-keeper, than live a Covenant-breaker. —Christopher Love