A book Packer thinks you should read three times

Justin Taylor at Between Two Worlds quotes J. I. Packer writing about Don Whitney’s Spiritual Disciples for the Christian Life –

“I can go on record as urging all Christians to read what Don Whitney has written; indeed, to read it three times over, with a month’s interval (certainly not less, and ideally, I think, not more) between each reading. This will not only make the book sink in, but will also give you a realistic picture of your seriousness, or lack of it, as Jesus’ disciple.

Your first reading will show you several particular things that you should start doing.

In your second and third readings (for each of which you should choose a date on the day you complete the previous reading) you shall find yourself reviewing what you have done and how you have fared in doing it. That will be very good for you, even if the discovery of it comes as a bit of a shock at first.”

God, sex and marriage — Christopher Ash

Christopher Ash (Director of PT Cornhill) spoke at the Moore College Centre for Christian Living two weeks ago. His topic was God, sex and marriage – what’s it all about?

Well worth hearing – 46 minute / 44MB mp3 file.

‘Why Pastors should flee the Ministry’

Read anything by Gregory of Nazianzus (329–389AD) lately? Keith Goad in Churchman (just posted on the web by Church Society) thinks there is good reason to do so –

“The purpose of this paper is to provide a vision of the pastorate from Gregory’s writing that will challenge pastors to reflect upon the gravity of their office and the responsibilities that are necessary to be faithful to the calling and the one who has called them. The end goal is not to have them flee the pastorate, though this will be tempting in light of Gregory’s vision, but to recognize their need for God’s grace to fulfill their duty and recommit themselves to the office and its high demands.”

– Read it here (PDF).

 

The minister’s Bible

Adrian Reynolds at the Proclamation Trust writes –

“We started a new series at church last Sunday evening … we read out a slightly modernised version of a prayer from the Valley of Vision. … Here’s the prayer. Good for every minister. Good for every Christian.

Read more

Discipling in the Church

The latest 9Marks Journal is out – and the theme is “Discipling in the Church”.

Lots of encouraging ideas. Get it here.

Best books on Preaching

Adrian Reynolds at The Proclamation Trust has been posting a series of brief thoughts on the books on preaching. He’s up to number 7 in his list –

“When The Trellis and the Vine came out, many of us thought ‘this is an excellent book, but where is preaching mentioned or championed?’ The answer was – if only we knew it – that we were waiting for volume 2. And it was worth the wait.”

His posts so far:

1. I Believe in Preaching by John Stott,
2. The Glory of Preaching by Darrell Johnson,
3. Expository Preaching by Haddon Robinson,
4. The Priority of Preaching by Christopher Ash,
5. Preaching and Biblical Theology by Ed Clowney,
6. Preaching and Preachers by Martyn Lloyd Jones,
7. The Archer and the Arrow by Phillip Jensen & Paul Grimmond.

Jim Elliot’s little-known brother

Justin Taylor draws attention to this powerful message from Randy Alcorn about Jim Elliot’s younger brother Bert, who went home to the Lord in February.

Free book — first draft of The Point of the Sword

Chris Green, Vice Principal of Oak Hill College in London, gave the Annual Moore College Lectures which concluded this morning. The theme of his lectures was – The Point of the Sword: Applying the Bible to applying the Bible.

He has kindly made available the text of his talks as a book-in-progress.

“I recently gave the Moore College lectures on applying the Bible. The aim is to finish writing them up and publish, but in the meantime here is the first draft, warts and all…”

You can download the 850kb Word file from Chris’ blog.

In addition, videos of his lectures as delivered are available here.

Are we together?

“R.C. Sproul has a long history of making a stand for truth. He has an equal history of standing firm against error, using his ministry platform to refute errors that are seeping into the Evangelical church. On several occasions he has reacted to those who have sought to minimize the differences between Protestant theology and Roman Catholic theology…”
– Tim Challies draws attention to a new book by R C Sproul.

Sproul: “In this book, I have a simple goal. I want to look at Roman Catholic teaching in several significant areas and compare it with Protestant teaching. I hope to show, often using her own words, that the Roman Catholic Church has not changed from what it believed and taught at the time of the Reformation. That means that the Reformation is not over and we must continue to stand firm in proclaiming the biblical gospel.”

See also the 80 second promo video here.

Why Johnny can’t sing hymns

The latest White Horse Inn broadcast –

“What is the impact of technology on the way we live and think as Christians? How has popular culture changed the way we worship on Sunday mornings? On this edition of the White Horse Inn, Michael Horton discusses these issues with T. David Gordon, author of Why Johnny Can’t Preach, and Why Johnny Can’t Sing Hymns.”

– Plenty of food for thought for ministers and congregations. Well worth listening. 36 minutes.

Applying the Bible to applying the Bible

Tonight’s public Moore College Lecture for 2012 – given by the Rev. Chris Green from Oak Hill College in London – was streamed live on the web. If you missed it, you can watch the full lecture here.

Info on the upcoming lectures here.

Challenging equality Britain

“George Orwell’s famous allegory, Animal Farm, gave us the wry phrase, ‘All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others’. It brought out the way that you could have all the talk about equality and rights, but that it actually worked out with inequalities and with favoured groups. In Animal Farm, you remember, it was the pigs who ended up more equal than others.

I suspect that is how many Christians are coming to think about equality Britain. It’s a Britain where comedians are feted for their ‘daring’ in taking on the Christian religion on national TV, while never quite having the bottle to dish out equal satire to the equally fervent Richard Dawkins. It’s a Britain where major human rights abuses against Christians in countries such as North Korea or Syria are not reported as such.

It’s a Britain where you pray with someone in hospital at your peril, in case some third party takes offence. It’s a Britain where a prime minister appears to be under the impression that he can change what constitutes marriage. I suspect many of us find ourselves both frustrated and bewildered. How did it come to this?…”

– Oak Hill Principal Mike Ovey writes in the latest issue of Oak Hill’s Commentary magazine – available as a 6.4MB PDF file. Download it for the many worthwhile articles.

Preserving the Gospel in the Seminary

in March last year, Albert Mohler (President of Southern Baptist Seminary) and Peter Lillback (President of Westminster Seminary) spoke about the history of their seminaries. It’s a good reminder of what needs to be preserved. From ‘Christ the Center’. (Audio & video here, or on YouTube – via Justin Taylor.)

The Two-Pronged Strategy of a Master Evangelist

“It’s amazing how culture changes and we don’t notice it. The practices that one generation took for granted become unknown, and slightly shocking, to a later generation. Even for those of us who live through the change it happens too incrementally for us to observe it. It is when we revisit the old times that we detect how much we have changed – sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worse, and often without any real difference.

Recently, I had the privilege of publicly interviewing John Chapman as he recounted his many decades of Christian ministry. In the interview, he unwittingly challenged us about changes happening that neither he nor we had noticed. …”

– Phillip Jensen writes in his weekly column. (Photo: John Chapman, 1980.)

Dick Lucas — The race set before us (2)

Dick Lucas preached on Hebrews 12:1-3 last Sunday at St Helen’s Bishopsgate.

Most encouraging.

See or hear it at the St. Helen’s website.

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