As we begin a new year with an emphasis on prayer in the life of our church, it’s worth pausing to consider what exactly we are emphasizing. What is prayer? For some, prayer is merely talking to God. The Lord speaks to us in the Bible and we speak to him in prayer. This is right and good. Prayer is verbal communication with the God who has revealed himself in the Bible. In fact, the richest prayers are those prayed in response to God’s revelation of himself in the [...]

On April 22, 1877, Charles Spurgeon, pastor of the Metropolitan Tabernacle in inner city London, preached on Isaiah 6:8. His sermon was titled “A Divine Call for Missionaries.” Isaiah 6:8 says, “I heard the voice of the Lord saying, ‘Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?’ Then I said, ‘Here am I, send me.’” The sermon begins with Spurgeon saying that missionary work among the nations should be pursued because the lost are perishing and because the only way for them to be saved is through [...]

The Bible begins and ends the same way, namely, with God living with his people in a garden-temple. This is why the tabernacle and temple, the places where God’s presence dwelt with Israel, were filled with garden imagery, with things like palm branches and pomegranates and a golden lampstand that looked like a tree with almond blossoms. God made us to live with him in a garden. This plan reaches all the way back to before creation. Why is there something rather than nothing? Why are there creatures who [...]

Several years ago I taught a course on productivity at a local Bible college and the reading we did together as a class literally changed my life. In preparation for the course I found Matt Perman’s book What’s Best Next: How the Gospel Transforms the Way You Get Things Done. There are thousands of books on productivity, but not many like this one. Perman approaches the topic theologically rather than pragmatically. The first part of the book is “First Things First: Making God Supreme in Our Productivity.” But there [...]

The law has many functions in the Bible. Protestants have historically noted three primary functions of the law. First, it prepares us for the gospel because it shows us that we are sinners who need a Savior (Rom. 7:7). Second, the law reveals God’s character, showing us what he values and what pleases him. And third, the law orders the lives of God’s people. This third purpose of the law teaches us at least three more things about the law. First, in the law, the Lord makes it clear [...]

There is a saying that goes something like this, “Life is short, live in the moment!” This saying basically means that, because we do not know when our lives will end, we should take advantage of every moment, or seek to get the most out of life while we can. There is an unhealthy way to apply this saying, a way that makes immediate gratification our constant goal, or a way that leads us to orient our lives around what we want instead of how we can serve others [...]

In his book The Abolition of Man, C. S. Lewis says that needing an explanation for everything is, in the end, impossible.  He says, “You cannot go on ‘explaining away’ for ever: you will find that you have explained explanation itself away.  You cannot go on ‘seeing through’ things for ever.  The whole point of seeing through something is to see something through it.  It is good that the window should be transparent, because the street or garden beyond it is opaque.  How if you saw through the garden [...]

“Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.” - Matthew 6:9   What does it mean that the first person of the Trinity is called “Father”? There is a lot that could be said here. Among other things, “Father,” according to Scott Swain, means, “Before the existence of creation…the Father and his only begotten Son dwelled in eternal, mutual delight in the fellowship of the Holy Spirit.” So, first and foremost, “Father” tells us something of how the persons within the Trinity relate. “Father” also means that all things [...]

“Our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.” – Titus 2:13-14   “But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit…The saying is trustworthy, and I want you to insist [...]

In his little book What Is Biblical Theology, Professor Jim Hamilton says, “What we think and how we live is largely determined by the larger story in which we interpret our lives.” Then he asks, “Does your story enable you to look death in the face? Does your story give you a hope that goes beyond the grave?” The story that creates and sustains this kind of hope is the story of the Bible, where we find the true story about how God defeated death. How this story grows [...]