“God is not pleased by the herculean efforts some people go to look so hard for hidden meanings—whether linguistic or allegorical or what have you—that they miss the simple point of what he said.” - Mark Ward

“Behind all this is a convoluted history and a painful reminder of why a written constitution is necessary. Israel does not have one….The United Nations action that formed Israel as a Jewish state required the early adoption of a constitution and the nation pledged to do so….It did not happen.” - World

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“The fluid nature of the term and its affinity among those on social media or podcasts distances it from many Christians. The term can be used both to represent a total abolishing of one’s faith or to describe one’s personal questioning and working out their salvation to greater faith.” - Lifeway

“With this theme of sloth as ‘love defective,’ Dante comes close to a biblical definition of sloth. Sloth isn’t just laziness. There is a deeper inner motivation to sin that, at its core, is a defective love.” - Ligonier

Recently, over at Proclaim & Defend, Taigen Joos offered some thoughts on projecting song lyrics on screens during congregational singing.

I appreciate pastor Joos’ focus on practicality, and that’s my focus here also. He’s absolutely correct that there are challenges involved in using screens without hymnals, and that churches should think through their options.

So, should churches use screens or hymnals? I see it as a question of tradeoffs. Both approaches have different strengths and weaknesses.

A bit of my background, so you can filter for bias:

“Whether we’re debilitated by such extreme anxiety that we can barely function or we’re simply tired, each day brings with it a choice. Each and every day, we have to choose to live. For those with mental affliction, making that choice can be grueling.” - TGC

“#1-Even if hymnals are available and acknowledged, hardly anyone…uses them….#2-Generally, there is very little to no harmony being sung….#3-It is much more difficult to teach through the stanza progression of hymns….#4-Only those familiar with the hymn can sing it.” - P&D

“It still has 37 member denominations. But, like those denominations, it is a shell of its former self, with a small staff and budget. What remains of the NCC is nestled in a small suite in the Methodist Building on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C. What happened?” - World

“I’m talking more about the disconnect between what people really believe and what the expectations of the tribe demand. And that is what I see to be so dangerous and exhausting to people.” - RNS

“Vermont and Oregon became the first states to drop the requirement that people who receive a lethal prescription must be citizens of the state, thereby sanctioning what has been described as ‘suicide tourism.’ Washington and Hawaii expanded those eligible to prescribe a fatal dose from physicians to other health-care professionals.” - BPNews

“we might safely conclude that many of those who joined and helped it spring up so quickly had shallow roots. Overall, Christians were not cultivated with deep roots in the truth God has revealed about Himself, His world, human beings, and His plan to make all things new.” - Breakpoint

“it’s safe to say that they didn’t consider God’s name too sacred to use in transliteration. Finally, we can eliminate the idea that they did so out of fear of the Jews…. let’s explore some other possibilities.” - Text & Canon

“How should Bible-believing Christians respond to the enormous pressure to conform to this culture? This edition of FrontLine magazine will help you address this question.” - P&D

“In a recent Ipsos Global Advisor survey… in nine countries where less than one-third of adults believe in God as described in holy scriptures, Generation Z was more likely to hold these convictions than boomers.” - CToday

“While…I don’t believe women should be the pastors or regular teachers of men in the church, I do believe that in the pushback against that idea of women pastors, often the case gets overstated, and there is an anti-women feel to it, which disturbs me.” - Randy Alcorn

Can you lose your salvation? Some teach that you can. Others feel like they have. But what does the Word of God promise regarding the eternal security of those who have truly trusted Christ as their Savior?

1. Salvation is God’s Work, Not Your Work.

If your eternal destiny relied on you, nothing about your future would be secure. But God designed salvation to depend on Himself alone. He offers salvation by grace through faith (Ephesians 2:8–9). Jesus Christ finished the work of your salvation on the cross. He rose from the dead leaving nothing for helpless sinners to do but believe on Him (Acts 4:12). God not only saves you, but He also keeps you saved (1 Peter 1:5).

“As… Oppenheimer reignites conversations about the ethics of nuclear technology, it’s a good opportunity for Christians to learn what distinguishes nuclear power from nuclear weapons and why the former can be a beneficial resource for humanity.” - TGC

“… or is there common ground on which Muslims, Catholics, and biblical fundamentalists can work together?” - P&D

“I predict that religious liberty advocates will ramp up their attack on Smith….They understand that 303 Creative was a wonderful victory, but it was a halfway victory.” - CToday

“reasons for switching to a new religious tradition or denomination…(56%) say it was because they stopped believing…. 30% indicate they were turned off by the religion’s negative teachings about or treatment of LGBTQ people, 29% say their family was never that religious growing up, 27% say they were disillusioned by scandals” - PRRI

“Binkley, who serves alongside his wife as co-pastor of the nondenominational Create Church based in Richardson, Texas, and is the president and CEO of the banking firm Generational Group…” - CPost

“When we announced the discontinuation of LifewayWorship.com, we were not, I think, totally prepared for the response of church leaders. I think we didn’t do enough listening with worship leaders who are in the trenches relying on this tool.” - BPNews

Read the series.

(Psalm 2:7-9; Psalm 91:1; Matthew 4:5-7, 10)

In the last installment, we began to ponder the temptation of Jesus from the angle of rabbinic debate and midrash, Satan pitted against Jesus. We introduced this subject and looked at the first temptation of Jesus in the wilderness. Today we will discuss Yeshua’s final two temptations. It is probable Jesus and Satan engaged in much more discussion than is recorded. We must remember that the Gospels are brief summaries.

“What we know for sure is that human anger does not end well. It does not bring about justice or righteousness. It does not make for a better world.” - Michael Brown

“Theologians in the Great Tradition testified to God’s self-disclosure in creation, but they were not satisfied to merely acknowledge the existence of natural revelation. No, they wanted to read and exposit God’s ‘second book’ ” - Credo

“Repeatedly, Solomon encourages us first to find and take joy in these ordinary aspects of life. And second, he urges us to recognize that these are good gifts from God” - Ligonier

“There will be yet another explosion next May, when United Methodism’s governing General Conference meets for the first time since 2019. With so many traditionalists gone, the convention will likely delete its current bans on same-sex rites and sex outside of male-female marriage.” - World

“This Scripture-first approach has produced powerful and important insights into such thorny issues as God’s will, human freedom and divine foreknowledge.” - CPost

The Lord Jesus Christ made two startling announcements, through the Apostle John, to the recipients of the book of Revelation.

Speaking to His congregation at Smyrna, He stated: “I know the blasphemy of those who say they are Jews and are not, but are a synagogue of Satan” (Rev. 2:9).

Then, He addressed the Philadelphian church regarding “those of the synagogue of Satan, who say they are Jews and are not, but lie” (Rev. 3:9).

“But if our understanding of the Great Commission is primarily a call to evangelism, we’ve forgotten a key piece: theology. Jesus’s final command isn’t a call to make converts but a call to make disciples.” - TGC