Westminster Books has identified some of their summer new and noteworthy books and put them on sale. There are some good books available.

Today’s Kindle deals include a bit of a mish-mash!
Becoming Writers Who Write the Truth Beautifully
“How do we grow to become writers who both write the truth and write it beautifully?” Lara has a wonderful reflection on this.
Involving Ourselves in Every Controversy?
“Part of the pernicious underbelly of the internet is that many allow themselves to be drawn into controversies about which they have no need to involve themselves. For many years, I too wanted juicy details about whatever controversy was swirling around in evangelical and Reformed circles.” This is an important topic.
Gospel-Driven Benevolence with Charles Spurgeon
Part theology and part biography, Spurgeon and the Poor examines how the Prince of Preachers’ belief that gospel preaching and soul-winning should be the church’s primary mission drove his mercy ministry. (Sponsored Link)
Will AI Help or Harm Content Creation?
“I’ll tell you at the beginning that I don’t know the answer to that question. But I do know that as with every tool, the wise and the foolish will use it differently. Therefore, whether it helps or harms content creation will be determined by which path we take. Will we take the path of fools or the path of the wise?”
Rejecting Your Maker Means Rejecting Your True Identity
“Society has jettisoned belief in God. When you reject your Maker, you reject the one who establishes your identity. People, though, naturally want to belong. They crave to connect with a community of people who share their values and feelings. With the Maker gone, there’s an identity vacuum that begs for a new way to view oneself. It makes sense that the concept of gender identity was born.” Alan Shlemon explains.
Make Sure You Don’t Join a Sexular Church
Stephen McAlpline: “The Sexular Age just keeps rolling on. Rolling on like waves on a beach. Tsunami waves. Crashing into a church near you. Let me explain.”
You asked: Why Visit Israel?
Lisa offers a few good reasons to consider a visit to Israel (for those for whom it’s possible).
Flashback: When God Seems Deaf To Our Cries
Joseph…died in peace and at a ripe old age, only because God had known better than to grant the most immediate answer to his most urgent prayers.

We see hardly one inch of the narrow lane of time. To our God, eternity lies open as a meadow. —Amy Carmichael

I am once again grateful to Children’s Hunger Fund for sponsoring the blog this week. “Across the US and in 29 countries around the world, faithful pastors and church volunteers from Children’s Hunger Fund church partners have dedicated their time to serving children and families in desperate situations.”

(Yesterday on the blog: The Gospel of Jesus)
Political Life Begins in the Church
Patrick Schreiner has an important article about the church’s primary (though not necessarily sole) political witness to the world.
Trusting God with The I-Don’t-Knows
“A mysterious curtain hangs just beyond this immediate present moment shielding our gaze from endless I-Don’t-Knows. Those I-Don’t-Knows are numerous, quite humbling, and often painful.”
Moses, the Mountain, and a Mass of Email
“Christians and non-Christians alike constantly talk about the need for ‘self-care’ these days. I wonder if farmers, working 80 hours a week in 1950s America, thought about ‘self-care.’ That is a rhetorical question.” Of course it is!
Once More, Church and Culture
There is a lot to ponder in this long article about the relationship of church and culture. “To ask about the church’s place in society while living in Christendom is redundant. The question answers itself. The question is genuinely new, however, when posed after Christendom.”
Freedom from the Burden of People Pleasing
Susan Narjala: “As a child, I learned to colour inside the lines. I do not mean just in art class, but that nature and nurture moulded me into a rule-follower.” She goes on to discuss how we can find freedom from people pleasing.
Could AI replace my pastor?
“The latest iteration of the chat bot can apparently produce sermons. You tell it your passage, how many points you want and point and shoot and away it goes. What you end up will be grammatically correct and may read well, though I think it comes across as a bit sterile. But to think that it is a sermon is to think wrongly about what preaching is.”

Just as evangelicals will fight their own individual sin as they keep in step with the Spirit, so we must fight the collective sin of allowing anything but the gospel to be the cause of our unity. —Michael Reeves

Good morning. May the Lord bless you and keep you today.

Westminster Books has a deal on a pair of new books meant to help fight addiction to pornography (and to help those who are so struggling).
Are Baptists ‘Reformed’? A Brief History of Baptist Identity
I enjoyed Timothy George’s look at the historical connection between Baptists and Reformed theology.
How Church Membership Gives Us Freedom
“Isn’t it ironic that a high commitment like church membership can bring about a sense of freedom? I’m not exactly sure how that works but I do have some clarity on what I think it’s not.”
I’ve Missed You
Speaking of being part of a church… “I’m so glad that you are pursuing God on your own. But your spiritual life isn’t intended to be lived out alone. It’s not even designed to be lived out with just you and your family. Part of God’s purposes for you are only found in the context of the gathered family of God.”
Look Again (Video)
I enjoyed this new song from 20schemes Music. Its repeated call is to look Christ in all our sorrows and trials.
The dream
Andrée Seu Peterson writes about a dream and what she gleaned from it.
You Are What You Eat
If we are what we eat, then we are also what we watch (or otherwise consume).
Where Doctrine Meets the Desolate
Lara d’Entremont: “As believers, we tend to think suffering should look a certain way. … But that’s not how it will always look. Sometimes, suffering will be a reckoning with our doctrine. It will appear as hopeless laments. Sometimes there may even be questions and doubts. But God is still there.”
Flashback: Set an Example in Your Purity
…one of the challenges of being a young Christian is determining that you will not succumb to the low expectations of those who are older than you.

Sin is deceitful and blinds us to the truth so we need others who will point out that truth to us. A sister-friend in the Lord who spots sin in our life and exhorts us to turn back to God is a good friend. —Christina Fox