“I believe in God, but I just don’t know if I can trust the God of the Bible. How can a good God have Israel wipe out the Canaanites? Or send people to hell?” I was speaking with an acquaintance at the gym when he asked me a question that many people quietly carry: how can a good God also be a God of wrath?
There are many thoughtful defenses to explain how a benevolent God rightly administers divine judgment. Writers like Paul Copan (Is God a Moral Monster: Making Sense of the Old Testament God) help us answer the Canaanite question reminding us that God gave the Canaanites
Every once in a while, a movie surprises you: not just with spectacle or clever twists, but with heart. Project Hail Mary did that for me. Adapted from Andy Weir’s highly acclaimed novel, Project Hail Mary is one of the most enjoyable movies I’ve seen in a long time: funny, imaginative, and genuinely moving. What lingered with me most after the credits rolled wasn’t the wow factor of the production (although all $248 million of its production costs make the movie visually stunning). It was the friendship.
That might sound strange for a movie about saving the world from an extinction-level threat.
What comes after expressive individualism? Trevin Wax says, “More and more people are shaping their sense of self through powerful group affiliations rather than as independent individuals. This isn’t a rejection of expressive individualism so much as its evolution…
The surprising importance of shallow Christian friendships: Danny D’Aquisto with a helpful contrarian perspective,
In 1985, Nintendo released Super Mario Bros. In the original video game you could choose to play one of the two plumbing brothers: Mario or Luigi. Short and red, tall and green: which would you be? In subsequent editions of the game, you could play a number of other characters including Yoshi or Princess Peach as your character. Choosing one’s character perfectly suited our generation, a generation that was told that we could do anything and be anyone.
We live in a world of choice and that now includes much of what we consider identity. From vocation to gender, the options appear nearly endless to the contemporary westerner.
“She’s gaslighting me.”
“He’s a narcissist.”
I regularly hear couples lob these accusations at one another as they sit across from me in my office. We live in a therapeutic culture, where psychologized language has permeated the way we talk about relationships. Categories and lingo once limited to clinical settings have become everyday vocabulary for explaining conflict.
Last year, Samuel James wrote an excellent post titled If You Ask AI for Marriage Advice, It’ll Probably Tell You to Get Divorced. The article is as good as its title suggests. In it, James shares a striking graph that tracks 15 years of relationship advice on Reddit.
What comes after expressive individualism? Trevin Wax says, “More and more people are shaping their sense of self through powerful group affiliations rather than as independent individuals. This isn’t a rejection of expressive individualism so much as its evolution…
The surprising importance of shallow Christian friendships: Danny D’Aquisto with a helpful contrarian perspective,
Raising church-loving children: Katie Polski says, “Before we talk about cultivating love for the church in our children, we must first remember what Scripture says about the church itself, especially in a cultural moment when the phrase, “I can have a relationship with Jesus and not go to church” is all too common.
Get married young: Brad Wilcox argues, “You might not guess it from watching the latest episode of Emily in Paris, but the happiest young women (22-35) today are not footloose and fancy free
The generational narcissism of thinking we always face the biggest crisis ever: A timely word from Trevin Wax, “It’s true, today’s challenges are real. But not unrivaled. This is why the insistence that we face the greatest crisis ever reveals something less about the moment and more about ourselves. It’s generational narcissism, the temptation to view our struggles as uniquely severe and our responsibilities as uniquely heroic.”
Would Jesus have been a socialist?: Christopher Cook answers, “Marx built his utopia through coercion, while Jesus builds His Kingdom through surrender.
Relating to a narcissist: Ed Welch with a thoughtful and empathetic treatment of a growing concern, “Diagnostic labels have their benefits and liabilities. They can help you see certain behaviors. They can also blind you by leading you to believe that everything is a result of the diagnoses, which it is not. For the person who wears the label, the word can be meaningless or offensive. It will not help.”
6 kinds of hearers of God’s Word: Brian Najapfour pulls his list straight from scripture. For instance, “She knows that she has blemishes, but she is afraid to face them. Like someone who avoids the doctor for fear of a bad diagnosis, Mrs. Afraid resists the conviction of the Word. She does not want to be confronted with the cost of repentance.”
How to get people to be friends with machines in three easy steps: Samuel James issues a serious warning about where AI is headed, This is fundamentally different than even the porn of the traditional Internet, and many of the typical ways in which pastors and counselors address it won’t suffice. Images and videos of performers are captivating enough to damage entire generations of addicts.”
The grief that doesn’t get a eulogy: Sethlina Amakye begins, “Grief isn’t just for the ones we’ve buried. It’s also for the versions of ourselves we’ve left behind, the life we thought we’d be living, the dreams that never made it out of our hearts, the paths we thought were specific and for sure but suddenly disappeared beneath our feet.”
A shard, sharpener, and sin: Rachel Whisman says, “One of my students probably thought, “Oh, I bet I can sharpen it just a little more. I wonder how small I can get it so I can still use it.” Then, the pencil was lost in the vortex of the sharpener and there were ramifications to that seemingly innocent action.”
When suffering knocks: Paul David Tripp says, “When hardship will come, we don’t know. How we will suffer may vary. But one thing is for sure: suffering will come knocking.”
1. Don’t scratch the itch: Brittany Allen begins, “I have a weird problem. When I get in the shower, my legs inevitably begin to itch like crazy. I cannot for the life of me find the self-control it takes to not scratch. I have a condition called dermatographism that causes my body to react to scratching with hives. By the time I step out of the steaming hot water, my thighs are covered with wheals. I scratched the itch and the itch only intensified.”
2. Should Christians plead the blood of Jesus? Wanjiru Ng’Ang’A explains the history of this prayer and then offers a warning,
6 discouraging trends in global Christianity: Aaron Earls reports, “While Christianity continues to grow, Islamic growth continues to outpace the church’s growth. Christianity slightly outpaced the global rate of population growth (0.98% v. 0.88%), but Islam grew even faster (1.67%).”
Wikipedia founder embraces Christianity: Trevin Wax reflects on Larry Sanger’s conversion, “Considering how many people are curious about the Bible these days, the increase in Bible sales, the interest in various philosophers and commentators providing their takes on the Scriptures,
The thief’s good works: Jackson Gravvitt considers two different perspectives on the thief on the cross: does the thief demonstrate that our faith is solely because of Christ’s work or through our good works that flow from Christ’s work?
Lessons from caring for a disabled child: Jamie MacGregor shares, “At first, we were told to terminate the pregnancy since it was likely that she would have disabilities. We responded that abortion was not an option. Then, we were told that we have no idea what it would be like to raise a child with special needs. The doctors were right. We had no idea how difficult it would be.”
A theology of leisure: Reagan Rose with an important piece. She says, “Many Christians have unthinkingly adopted a view of leisure that sees rest time as synonymous with me time. But this is a historical anomaly.”
The church’s unsung hero: the persevering Sunday School teacher: Can we get an amen to Trevin Wax’s post? God bless our amazing faithful teachers! “Committed Sunday school teachers are a big part of what makes discipleship effective. Yet how often do we let weeks and years go by without lifting up their example or celebrating their faithfulness?”
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