Christian Living

Want to Join the Team?

Want to Join the Team?

On November 3 my first book will hit the shelves. Whether you know it or not, you’ve been an important partner in writing this book. The book is co-authored by my friend and fellow blogger, Benjamin Vrbicek and it is on the topic of blogging. Blogging for God’s Glory in a Clickbait World is a guide for bloggers or aspiring bloggers, pointing them back to the goal of Christian blogging and providing helpful practices and tips.

For those of you who have an itch to write, I hope this book provides a nudge and a road map. For those of you who have friends who are bloggers or who might blog, I hope that you consider gifting this book to them as an encouragement.

You’ve been here with me through this journey of blogging and I would be honored if you would consider joining our Launch Team. Here is what it will mean.

If you are willing to serve on the launch team, we will send you a digital version of the book in the next few weeks to give you time to read it before its November 3 launch.

This Week's Recommendations

This Week's Recommendations

1. How to 'Disciple' Your Kids into Church Dropout Status: Jared Wilson shares six ways that, by going along with cultural Christianity, we de-church our kids. His fifth way is by church hopping, He explains, "But families that hop from church to church as kids grow or tastes change or disappointments accumulate train their kids to treat church not like a family one commits to through thick and thin but like a consumeristic product one can always throw away for a perceived upgrade. And this is just one step away from deciding church in general isn’t useful."

2. Why the Current Loneliness Epidemic is a Gospel Opportunity: Sam Kim wonders, "Perhaps our culture’s current crushing opioid crisis, porn addiction, and the rise of Tinder are all part of this holy searching gone horribly wrong."

3. The Celebrity Pastor We've Never Known: Tim Challies helps us open our eyes to another kind of pastor who ought to be famous, "When we remember those men who most faithfully pastored us, we probably think of more than their sermons. And there’s a reason for that. The faithful pastor serves his people faithfully not just in the most public element of his ministry, but also in the most private."

4. 4 Theological Questions Your Church Has About Regathering: Kent Annan and Jamie Aten ask four timely questions: “1) Is not going back to church asking out of fear instead of faith?” “2) If I wear a mask, am I acting out of fear than faith?” “3) Is it rude to ask people to wear masks to church?” “4) Should we stay united in Christ even when we disagree?”

5. A #2020 Confession: Molly Montana’s prayer is simple and poignant.

6. One of the Most Misused Words Today: Craig Troxel tells us how we misuse the word heart today.

Who Would Have Guessed?

Who Would Have Guessed?

God has designed us to be a people of stories. Every night as we gather around our dinner table we share stories.

And yet, after I finished college, I set aside fiction reading for many years. Non-fiction seemed practical. Fiction seemed frivolous. Why listen to stories, when you can learn facts?

Some years back, I picked up fiction again, and I realized that in setting fiction aside for a diet of only non-fiction, my imagination shriveled, and my ego grew. Humility begets imagination, and imagination fosters humility.

Who would have imagined this world we are living in? No one would have predicted a year ago that our lives would have looked like this.

Rooting Against the Patriots: on Enemies and Criticism

Rooting Against the Patriots: on Enemies and Criticism

Life is more comfortable in black and white. Life is simpler when our enemies are despicable and our friends are admirable.

Outside of New England, America hates the New England Patriots. In the past twenty years, the Patriots have been in the Superbowl an astonishing nine times, winning six of those. Over that span they’ve had the incredible fortune of having perhaps the greatest coach, Bill Belichick, and the greatest quarterback, Tom Brady, in the NFL’s history team-up. On several occasions, the league caught them playing fast and loose with the rules. The combination of success and a marred record has made New England the perfect villain for American football fans.

My son rejoiced when the Patriots’ Tom Brady left the Patriots and signed with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, leaving the Patriots high and dry. And he celebrated when one of his least favorite football players, Cam Newton, signed as the Patriots new quarterback. Why? Because we like it when our enemies are easy to hate.

THE EVIL EMPIRE

He’s just like his dad and grandfather. I grew up hating the Yankees. My dad used to joke that his two favorite baseball teams were “the Royals, and whoever is playing the Yankees.” I agreed. The problem was, at the height of their powers in the 90s, there weren’t very many unlikable Yankees. I rejoiced when the unlikeable, steroid-abusing A-Rod signed with the “Evil Empire” in 2004. His presence helped justify my hatred.

For those of you who are rolling your eyes at my immaturity, I wonder if you might suffer the same disease in different areas? Did you hope for the worst candidate from the opposition party to make it out of the primaries? When the opposing party is in power, do you hope that they shine, or do you want them to fail (just as long as it doesn’t hurt you)?

For many of us, if we are honest, politics are a team sport, and if our team can’t win, we root for the opposing team to lose.

This Week's Recommendations

This Week's Recommendations

1. How Early Christianity Was Mocked for Welcoming Women: Michael Kruger reminds us that while only one-third of Rome’s citizens were women, women comprised two-thirds of the early church, “And it is this reality that sets the stage for the critics of early Christianity. If they were looking for a way to undermine this new religious movement (and they were!) then the involvement of women is an easy target.”

2. God is Not a God of Second Chances: Provocative article by Aaron Wilson. He begins by explaining, "A second-chance gospel reveals half of the good news—the half that says Jesus died for sins. The fact that God is merciful is a beautiful truth. But if Jesus only died to forgive sins, humanity is still in trouble."

3. Why Procrastination is About Managing Emotions, Not Time: Do you struggle with procrastination? You'll find this helpful. New psychological studies are revealing that, "The task we’re putting off is making us feel bad – perhaps it’s boring, too difficult or we’re worried about failing – and to make ourselves feel better in the moment, we start doing something else, like watching videos."

4. Homeschool Surge: Given the difficulty of online education, I’m not surprised that there is a big surge in homeschooling during this strange year. Esther Eaton at World reports, “A May survey found 40 percent of parents compelled to school at home because of COVID-19 said they’d be more likely to homeschool in the future.”

5. Who is Most Generous? Not Who You’d Expect: John Lee reflects on Barna findings that the three most generous cities in the US are located in one state. What state do you think it is? “Christians in these cities give on average $17,977 to charity annually.” Meanwhile, other cities give just over $3,300 a year. Lee then dives deep into what most powerfully motivates us to give.

6. How Presidential Debates Have Changed: A lot is packed into this six-minute video.

In Honor of Pastor Matt

In Honor of Pastor Matt

Last month Pastor Matt Ristuccia retired after 35 years of pastoral ministry in Princeton, New Jersey. I met Matt seventeen years ago on a Sunday morning in August. Matt stepped up behind a modest wooden pulpit in a navy blazer and baby blue tie and then came to life. From the elbow of that odd L-shaped sanctuary, he pivoted to the left and right, holding the physically split congregation of Westerly Road Church (called Stone Hill Church today) together by sheer force of will. Animated and winsome, he had my attention.

I was a new seminary student at Princeton Theological Seminary, and my young bride and I were trying to find our way in this strange new land of ivy. Ahead of me was a journey of theological and character formation. I was an evangelical at a mainline seminary, unsure whether I would land in academia or pastoral ministry and where I would find a church that would fit.

Angel and I approached Matt after the service and introduced ourselves. He was just as lively in person as he was behind the pulpit. Over the following ten years, I would become an attendee at Westerly Road Church, then a member, an intern, ordained, and finally a pastor. Matt would dedicate both of our children and would become one of the most influential mentors in my life.

Looking back on those formative years under Matt’s pastoral leadership, these are the top seven lessons I learned from Matt:

This Week's Recommendations

This Week's Recommendations

1. The Day My Foster Son Leaned into Me: Russ Meek shares the moment his three-year-old foster son began to trust him. He shares, "Andrew won’t remember this moment, and God willing his body will forget the scarring on his heart. But for these past three years he has carried the trauma. Tense, unwilling to relax even for a moment, and constantly on high alert, he’s carried in his body the wounds of abandonment, of exposure to places and things no child should see, and of the absence of a person to help him navigate this world wrought with danger and the unknown."

2. 5 COVID-19 Problems that Have Gotten Worse for Pastors: Aaron Earls begins with this stat about disunity, “In April, 8% of pastors said they were facing disagreement and complaints within their congregation. By July, that number had jumped to 27%.” The rest of the stats are just as discouraging.

3. Pastor, Don't Imply That Church is Optional: Trevin Wax with wise counsel for pastors. He shares, "When I was a student in Romania, American evangelists would come and preach, and they’d sometimes say things like, “I’m calling you to trust in Jesus, not to become part of the church.” The translators would always change that last part."

4. 7 Lies the Church Believes About Singleness: One of the most thoughtful writers on this subject, Sam Allberry offers his wisdom on the subject. His third misconception is that "Singleness means no intimacy." He explains, "Our culture (and often the church) has so conflated sex and intimacy that we find it hard to conceive of any forms of intimacy that are not ultimately about sex."

5. Explore the Alps: Stop what you're doing and immerse yourself in three minutes of God's glory.

Healthy Churches Multiply

Healthy Churches Multiply

In the sixty-year history of New Life we’ve planted one church intentionally and at least three unintentionally. I’ve heard the unintentional church plant called a “splant”—a conflation of “split” and “plant.” If you’ve been a Christian for a while, you’ve probably lived through one. Maybe an associate pastor at your church started a church a few miles down the road without the elders’ blessing. Maybe a senior pastor was fired and then started a church nearby, or left and then returned to start a church. Sometimes church leadership retroactively calls these splits plants, and often not with any poor intent: they’re trying to be gracious.

I wonder if that one plant for every three splants is reflective of the average church. My hunch is that splants outpace plants. That is heartbreaking.

Obviously, there is often culpability on those who splant, but churches bear responsibility as well. Far too few churches are committed to God’s intention for them to multiply.

First, let’s confess: it’s hard to multiply. Planting churches is taxing on the mother church. It taxes time, energy, finances, and (most significantly) people. It’s painful. But it’s biblical.

Churches, like people, are intended to be streams not ponds, highways, not cul-de-sacs. The book of Acts shows us a healthy church multiplying itself across the Roman Empire and beyond. Paul is a church planter. Paul’s letters to Timothy and Titus are coaching documents for these elder-pastors. If you pick up any of Paul’s other epistles, Paul is training the city-churches at Ephesus, Philippi, Colossae, etc. Many forget that these letters weren’t letters to a single church. They were written to one city church, a network of churches in the city. These churches were so connected that Paul could write one letter that would be read by all of them. These were multiplying churches.

It is estimated that only 2% of churches in the United States are multiplying and less than .1% are involved in a multiplying movement. Isn’t that disheartening?

Do You Want to Be Inspired to Pray? Try These Three Books

Do You Want to Be Inspired to Pray? Try These Three Books

I don’t know a Christian who hasn’t struggled at one time or another in their life with prayer. We long to experience God as others seem to in prayer. But prayer itself can feel like a massive challenge. In this hare-world of notification and hustle, prayer represents a tortoise reality. We know it’s the better way, but how do we live like that?

I still feel like a toddler in my prayer life, but two books have encouraged and strengthened me in my prayer life this year. A third book encouraged me years ago and still inspires me today. I commend all three to you. They are very different. Pick up one that you think will help you the most and dive in. My prayer for you (and me) isn’t for knowledge about prayer, but for a revitalized longing for Christ and communion with him.

This Week's Recommendations

This Week's Recommendations

1. Kids Spending 500% More Time in Front of Screens During Quarantine: James Lang suggests that, “The trouble with excessive screen time is that it eclipses healthy behaviors that all children need.”

2. Will Hell Really Last Forever? This is a thoughtful and thorough response by Greg Morse. I find this part of his argument most persuasive: "The answer is clear enough in Revelation 16:8–11, where people under God’s judgment 'gnawed their tongues in anguish and cursed the God of heaven for their pain and sores. They did not repent of their deeds.'”

3. 4 Disturbing Trends in Global Persecution: Please pray for Christ's church. The fourth in Aaron Earls's report is, "Christianity is on the verge of disappearing in Iraq and Syria. The presence of terrorist groups and conflicts in both Middle Eastern countries have led to the rapid decline of the Christian populations. Before the extended conflicts began, Iraq and Syria had 3.7 million Christians. Now that has dropped to around 946,000, according to Open Doors."

4. Here come the Skinny Cows: Mark Deymaz and Harry Li with a disturbing forecast of dramatically decreased giving to churches in the coming years. They explain four factors that might lead to a decline of up to 30% drop in giving. One of the four factors is a decrease in giving to religious institutions, "Individual giving in general is trending down, the report said, but religious giving is being hit by other factors like the growing disaffiliation of Americans with religious groups."

5. 4 Principles for Talking to Your Kids About Sex: Julie Lowe’s short article is on point. Her final point is, “Fourth, talk soon. Be the one who shapes your child’s view on sex and sexuality. It is far better to proactively inform your child’s view on a subject, than to have to go back and debunk an inaccurate view.”

6. Hawaii's Forest Eater: Stunning up close footage of the devastating 2018 volcano in Hawaii.