The Plodding Preacher

A young woman starves herself because she believes that she is fat despite the fact that her body is dangerously thin.  Society demands that we intervene in a fashion that helps this young woman to bring her understanding into line with the reality of her body's condition. A second young woman decides that she is really a man despite the fact that she is clearly, biologically a woman.  In this case, society demands that we support her in her contrary to reality understanding of her body, we must pay for expensive hormone treatments and mutilating surgery in order to conform her bodily reality to the mental understanding she has of herself. Discuss.

Another "Is water wet?" type survey by World magazine confirms what the Bible has taught for millennia.  For millennials who grew up attending church, having a strong Christian faith and practice today is linked to the quality of their relationship with their parents. That’s a conclusion from a new online survey of young adults between the ages of 18 and 38 who attended church as children or teenagers. The survey also found that frequent church attendance and homeschooling were linked to stronger Christian beliefs and behaviors as adults, including believing Jesus is divine and avoiding co-habitation. Young adults who said their fathers explained “biblical principles” to them on a daily or weekly basis growing up were significantly more likely to say they lived by typical Christian behavior as adults by praying, volunteering, reading the Bible, and attending church frequently and avoiding pornography, marijuana use, abortion, and co-habitation.   Read the Whole Arti...

Sin and the child of God are incompatible. They may occasionally meet; they cannot live together in harmony. John Stott

The evangelical world seems to be enamoured with liturgy and ritual these days.  I am absolutely amazed by how many so-called evangelical writers made there blog today about lent.  To me the most pertinent question is "Which Scripture encourages us to observe a period of self-sacrifice and mourning to commemorate Christ's death and resurrection?"  This observance was begun by a church that believes our sufferings are necessary to fill up/complete the sufferings of Jesus' redemptive suffering.  That is unbiblical.  It seems to me that this passage in Zechariah asks some important questions about our man-made observances. ESV Zechariah 7:1 In the fourth year of King Darius, the word of the LORD came to Zechariah on the fourth day of the ninth month, which is Chislev. 2 Now the people of Bethel had sent Sharezer and Regem-melech and their men to entreat the favor of the LORD, 3 saying to the priests of the house of the LORD of hosts and the prophets,...

"Christians in community must again show the world, not merely family values, but the bond of the love of Christ." Christian Quote by - Edmund Clowney

Dakota Johnson,   Glamour , January 30: "But I don't want my family to see [the movie], because it's inappropriate. Or my brothers' friends, who I grew up with. I think they'd be like, 'Blegh.' Also there's part of me that's like, I don't want anyone to see this movie. Just kidding." Dakota is the lead actress in the Fifty Shades of Grey movie. Jamie Dornan,   Glamour , January 30, 2015: "Some of the Red Room stuff was uncomfortable. There were times when Dakota was not wearing much, and I had to do stuff to her that I'd never choose to do to a woman." Jamie Dornan,   Elle UK , January 2, 2015, on visiting a sex dungeon: "It was an interesting evening. Then go back to my wife and newborn baby afterwards … I had a long shower before touching either of them." Jamie is the lead actor in the same movie.  Shouldn't that shame tell you something??

God moves in a mysterious way His wonders to perform; He plants His footsteps in the sea, And rides upon the storm. Deep in unfathomable mines Of never-failing skill He treasures up His bright designs, And works His sovereign will. Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take, The clouds ye so much dread Are big with mercy, and shall break In blessings on your head. Judge not the Lord by feeble sense, But trust Him for His grace; Behind a frowning providence He hides a smiling face. His purposes will ripen fast, Unfolding every hour; The bud may have a bitter taste, But sweet will be the flower. Blind unbelief is sure to err, And scan his work in vain; God is His own interpreter, And He will make it plain.   William Cowper

50 Shades of Grey is coming to the theaters.  Statistics say that 30% of "Christian women" have read this book.  The rationalizations have already begun among Christians for seeing the movie.  NO! This post by Kevin DeYoung says all that needs to be said.  See the Article HERE . There is nothing gray about whether a follower of Christ should see  50 Shades of Grey . This is a black and white issue. Don’t go. Don’t watch it. Don’t read it. Don’t rent it. I don’t even want to talk about it. Another blogger and I went back and forth for several weeks about how we could write a satirical review panning the movie and skewering those who think they need to see it in order to be relevant. We couldn’t do it. There was no way to make the humor weighty enough to sufficiently condemn such a vile film. And no, I haven’t seen the movie. I haven’t watched the trailer either. I haven’t read a single page from the book. Reading about the premise from Wikiped...

God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing. C.S. Lewis

"Everybody knows something's broken in the world. But illogically, foolishly, we are looking for fixes from broken people with broken ideas in broken places."  Matt Chandler

Christians are all abuzz of our latest Christian champion riding her charger into battle with the secular media establishment.  Carrie Underwood has thrown down the gauntlet and professed her determination to sing about her faith.  The evangelical church has immediately gone into a swoon because very rarely do any of the really famous people in the world say that they are on our side.  Finally, we have a big name who justifies our right to be people of faith. Hold on a minute.  Are we really this desperate?  The song that created this tempest is hardly one worth dying for.  The point of this song is to describe a life changed by baptism and the catch line is "there must of been something in the water."  Really?  I'm a Baptist and I understand believer's baptism as being very important, but nothing changed because of the water.  It is Jesus who changes hearts and minds, not the baptismal tank.  The name Jesus is not even mentioned in th...

One of our church members asked me to comment on a blog by Justin Taylor done last week at the Gospel Coalition Website.  My alma mater's website has already presented an excellent response to Taylor's very weak arguments for an old earth interpretation of Genesis 1. Biblical Reasons to Believe that the Creation Days Were 24-Hour Periods Posted on   February 2, 2015   by   Mark Snoeberger When   Justin Taylor released a blog entry   last Wednesday defending a non-literal use of days in Genesis 1, and thus suggesting at least the possibility that the universe is quite ancient, both   Ben Edwards   and I sat down, without consulting, to write responses. While identical in ideology, our approaches were different enough, I think to merit posting both. Below, then, is a point-by-point answer to Taylor’s major arguments followed by my own counterargument in favor of 24-hour days. Taylor’s article begins with five alleged premises/presuppositio...