“At the same time, 56% of adults express support for policies aimed at protecting trans people from discrimination in jobs, housing and public spaces.” - Pew

“1. Are you physically and emotionally able to continue to lead at a high level?…2. Are you still highly motivated in your place of leadership?… 3. Are you a continuous learner? 4. Are you hanging on primarily for financial reasons?…” - Thom Rainer

When is the right time for a pastor to retire? There clearly is no one size fits all answer to this question. There are too many variables, and each situation must be considered individually. More to the point, when’s the right time for this pastor to retire? I do have a few thoughts about that question.

“When someone senses we have goodwill and respect for them, it enables them to lower their defenses and hear what we’re saying. Sincere kindness can therefore help us make progress in a disagreement.” - TGC

“This month marks five years since my family and I survived a plane crash. When landing, the plane skidded off the runway and down a steep incline, breaking in two before it ran into a concrete barrier that stopped it.” - 9 Marks

“It is enough, in the most positive sense of that clause. The Lord gives good gifts to his people, and he gives them abundantly. So what’s next? Don’t know. I’ve done some thinking about it, but I haven’t finalized my priorities yet.” - Dan Olinger

“1. Stop saying, ‘Turn to your neighbor and say ____’. Your church members love you and won’t tell you this, so that’s why I’m here. It feels forced, awkward and very cheesy. Trust me, your church members hate it.” - Phil Cooke

“Through a series of videos on the topic in the What Would You Say? series, we contend that if life begins at conception, which has been a central pro-life talking point for decades, IVF as currently practiced needs far more regulation, not less.” - Breakpoint

“There are two key areas in which the biblical pattern is accountability to the congregation—the entire church body—and where decision-making is assigned to the entire church body…. in financial accountability and in church discipline.” - P&D

“Immigration, particularly unauthorized immigration, presents complex challenges. Our laws need compassion, clarity and enforcement…. Laws help maintain order and safety in a society. However, much of the rhetoric dominating conversations and social media is unproductive and divisive.” - Baptist Press

“Worship is not simply right thinking, which computers can do. Worship is right feeling about God. That’s really crucial, unless we begin to think that artificial intelligence can take the place of human beings in accomplishing the divine purpose in the universe.” - John Piper

“It is the character of this channel to attempt to answer patiently charges that are clearly wrong, even ridiculous. Let us begin our discussion of Revelation 13:8.” - Mark Ward

Editor’s note: If you’re in a hurry, 3:40 is a good place to jump in.

So we’re fighting a three-front war—something no one’s likely to win without divine power. Let’s take a look at the first enemy, the world.

I wrote some on this just a few posts ago, focusing primarily on definitional matters. Here I’d like to focus on how to fight so as to win. I think a key biblical source on this question is John’s first epistle.

The Right Family

“Every time we let someone say, ‘Oh, I’m just a mom,’ and don’t honor her work, we let stand the idea that serving the vulnerable is somehow a lesser existence—when in reality it is the foundation of any society that hopes to survive.” - Acton

“When we don’t make a point of singing to one another, we forget musical worship is a mutual activity, a discipline that calls us to recognize and relate to each other as we worship the Lord.” - TGC

“To the shock of hundreds of thousands of normie conservatives… Rubin was congratulated by official TheBlaze TV and PragerU accounts. Other prominent conservatives, including Christopher Rufo and Christina Pushaw, slapped the ‘expectant’ fathers on the virtual back. Gov. Ron DeSantis sent the babies onesies. So what do these ‘conservatives’ think they are conserving?” - WNG

The question of whether the Bible teaches eternal security or that believers are “once saved always saved” is not uncommon at all. We might recall Nicodemus—a brilliantly educated Jewish leader—asking Jesus how things related to the new birth and salvation could actually be.¹ In a sense, Jesus’s answers were so simple that they seemed to throw Nicodemus for a bit of a loop. But Jesus’s teaching in John 3 is very clear.²

“Google’s chip sort of working cannot be interpreted as evidence for parallel universes because its function is entirely consistent with theories in which ours is the only universe. The headlines, as Shenvi put it, are ‘overblown and sensationalistic.’” - Breakpoint

What will actually happen with Gaza? The president has suggested that the U.S. take over the land and build it into a beautiful place. Is this realistic? What are your thoughts?

“The most common reason given by parents of homeschooled children is concern about the school environment – such as safety, drugs or negative peer pressure (83% of parents of homeschooled children cite this as a reason).” - Pew

“Americans started having a lot fewer babies around 2007, and fertility has not recovered. Each year since, fewer and fewer elementary, middle, and high schoolers have boarded school buses. This year, the American birth dearth turned 18, which means colleges and universities are beginning to feel the pinch.” - Breakpoint

“However, faced with brutal repression by the Russians, then the Nazis, then the Russians again, and now Putin (Russia again), the record is clear: Whether it was from Lenin and Stalin starving the Ukrainian people to cow them into submission, or from death squads during World War II, the Ukrainian people have suffered and yet retained a distinct Ukrainian cultural identity.” - World

“Consider for a moment how tragic it would be if there were no answer to this question…. Yet it’s equally tragic to incorrectly answer the question.” - Ligonier

“Sometimes, our spiritual struggles come not because we have neglected God’s word but because we have neglected his world. …We may indeed have spiritual issues to address. But our first solution may simply be this: open your eyes and ears and wonder at the world God made.”- Desiring God

In the previous installment, I began building upon a statement by my professor of systematic theology at Faith Baptist Theological Seminary, Dr. Myron J. Houghton. Basing his thoughts on 2 Cor. 2:15-16, Dr. Houghton stated: “Your ministry is like a fragrance. It will attract some, and it will repel others.”

We are considering here some Biblically legitimate means of making our ministries of the utmost appeal to the greatest number of people. In the first place, we considered the need to know our audiences. We will look at the final two ideas in this, the concluding installment.

“The phenomenon can be called the ‘Sunday to Monday gap,’ the ‘sacred and secular divide’ or practical atheism. Call it what you will, but seeing all aspects of our lives through the lens of our faith in God can often be counterintuitive.” - IFWE

“A group of more than 1,000 concerned students, alumni and their family members have signed a letter demanding a change in leadership at Wheaton College in Wheaton, Illinois, amid what they describe as the flagship Evangelical institution’s mission drift.” - CPost

Also: Wheaton College clash over Russell Vought escalates, exposing evangelical fault lines - RNS

“President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Tuesday to expand access to in vitro fertilization (IVF) and other fertility treatments through the reduction of out-of-pocket costs.” - Fox

Related:

“The ministers, mostly from Grand Rapids, are no longer willing to abide the denomination’s increasingly rigid stance on sexuality.” - RNS

“ ‘It’s the end of an era,’ said Tiffany Thigpen following the announcement that the Southern Baptist Convention’s (SBC) Executive Committee is no longer pursuing the implementation of an abuser database.” - C.Leaders

Also…