Month: November 2010

New source for eBooks

Monergism has announced that they are now selling eBooks, both in iPad and Kindle formats.  They are making available many older works as well as new works at reduced prices (often 20% less than list price).  If you have an eBook reader, this is a good source to find some harder to find books. As […]

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How to see yourself with clarity

It is true that we need to be careful how we live.  We need to have eyes of discernment.  We need to see ourselves clearly, to have the cloudiness of cataracts and the murkiness of sleepiness removed.  But how? In his book, Speaking the Truth in Love, David Powlison offers some insight on this very […]

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Be careful how you live

“The unexamined life is not worth living,” wrote the ancient secular philosopher. That is true for believers as well.  The practice of self-examination is wise and profitable for every believer.  It is important to “try to learn what is pleasing to the Lord” (Eph. 5:10) so that we might cultivate discernment in the daily choices […]

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Is alcohol ok for believers?

In Ephesians 5:18, Paul contrasts being filled with the Holy Spirit by the control that is experienced by those who are under the drunken influence of alcohol.  While the main focus of the analogy is on being filled by the Spirit — Paul is using drunkenness as an illustration only, not as a major theological […]

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Sunday Leftovers (11/14/10)

When the Scriptures speak of the will of God, there are two possibilities in view — either the sovereign, decreed will of God by which He governs all the affairs of creation, or the moral will of God by which He reveals the commands of which are incumbent on all men to follow. And in […]

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John 3:16

Martin Luther called this verse “the gospel in miniature” because there was a sense in which the entire story of the Bible is expounded in it.  Just two weeks before he died, he repeated the text with evident ecstasy and added, “What Spartan saying can be compared with this wonderful brevity?  It is a Bible […]

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Prayer Answered by Crosses

Echoing the same theme that I found yesterday in John Donne’s poem, “Batter My Heart” (aka “Holy Sonnet XIV”), John Newton penned “Prayer Answered by Crosses.”  It is yet another testimony that grace is found in burdens.  God’s favor is evidenced in the revelation of “the hidden evils of my heart.”  These devices and more […]

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Batter My Heart

What will you accept and even desire from God for the transformation of your heart?  What do you long for God to do to you and in you so that you will walk in newness of life and be freed from the daily temptations of sin and the desires of the flesh? Last night, my […]

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What confession looks like

Jon Bloom contemplates what it would have looked like for Zacchaeus to confess his sin to those whom he’d defrauded and in the process, dismember an idol from his own heart: “Dad, there’s a man at the door. He said his name is Zacchaeus.” “Zacchaeus!” Judah’s face flushed with sudden anger. “What does he want?” […]

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A greater event

There are many significant events in the history of the world.  Great men and leaders have risen and fallen.  Great civilizations have been established and others destroyed.  Great movements and developments and advancements have been made in language and science and knowledge.  But the advent of Christ was the greatest event in all of history […]

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