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To My Newest Children, With Love

The anticipation of the joyful arrival of our newest children has yielded and given way to the realization of their joyful arrival. Our family of three is now a family of five. Thinking upon the events surrounding the arrival of our two newest gifts from God, I penned these words to my newest children as a sort of paternal plea. While these words were aimed at my children, they are also a summons to my own heart to remember the all surpassing goodness of God.

The Only Two Days That Matter

In a few days, my wife and I will welcome God’s gift of twins with a long-anticipated, long-hoped-for embrace. The drawing near of that day in which our anticipated joy will find its completion means that every day until then is oriented to that day. Rooms are rearranged. Bottles are cleaned. Rest is stockpiled. The future has commandeered the present. This day is different, it’s changed, because of that day.

A New Resource for Families

When God commands Adam and Eve to be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth in Genesis 1, God is making known that His design and purpose for the whole of His world is the family. God appoints the family, founded by a man and woman united together in the covenant of marriage, to be the fundamental building block of His world. And God appoints the family to be the instrument He uses to complete His purpose for creation—filling it with a people who love Him and love one another. In this way, God intends what is true of families to be true of His world.

J.R.R. Tolkien, G.K. Chesterton, & An Invitation to Wonder

I am afraid we have lost our sense of wonder. The world is ablaze with wonder, and we seem far too unaware, far too blind to the grandeur of God with which the world burns. We are creatures whose appetites for wonder have been dulled by the numbing power of self-dependency. We have tethered our trust to ourselves and thereby removed any possibility to be held captive by anything beyond ourselves. But there is a way to wonder again, and J.R.R. Tolkien and G.K. Chesterton help us understand how.

Work is What Makes Us Human

The following is an edited transcript from Session Two of the FaithWork Initiative.

In Session Two, we will explore the idea that our work is what makes us human. As we mentioned in Session One, our work exceeds the bounds of paid vocations and includes the whole of our lives—our work as fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters, neighbors and citizens. With this framing our understanding of work, the thesis of Session Two is that be at work in God’s world is to be human, and to be human is to be at work in God’s world. 

Where Your Saturdays Are, There Your Heart Will Be Also

The pageantry of college football is inescapably enticing. The crisp autumn air, the marching band, the roar of tens of thousands of fans all collide in a unique array of intoxicating sensations. At its best, college football is the God-honoring display and God-honoring enjoyment of God’s good gifts. At its worst, however, it is an enslaving idol that captures our worship and dulls our affections for God.

The Co-Existence of Christianity and Islam in Public Schools

There has long been debate and confusion over the place of Christianity in the American public square. Most iconically, the Scopes Trial in Tennessee typified the impassioned debate over what some have believed is Christianity’s lawfully unique and supreme, if not exclusive, place in the public square. In a country that many believe finds its roots in Christian belief and doctrine and is also a champion for religious liberty, the debate is certain to continue. And the fire of the debate has found new kindling in a Tennessee classroom.

Look & Live: Ephesians 2:10-13

For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them. Therefore, remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh—called the uncircumcision by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands—remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. Ephesians 2.10-13

Work & The Biblical Narrative

The following is an edited transcript from session one of the FaithWork Initiative.

The FaithWork Initiative was birthed out of a desire to equip the church to do the work of the ministry as God commands in Ephesians 4.12. It may seem strange that we want to connect work and ministry, but that is exactly our aim. We want to reiterate at the beginning of our journey that we believe the realm of faith and the realm of work do not stand apart and separate. Biblically, our work in God’s world is to be faithful worship of God.

Look & Live: Ephesians 2:4-10

But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them. Ephesians 2.4-10

Poppy and the Red Petal Poppies: A Short Story (Part One)

There lived a small man named Poppy in a small cottage in a small village in a small, far off country. In Poppy’s small village there were other small cottages where other small people lived. In this particular small village, the small people loved to make small paper poppy flowers. They would spend hours to make each petal as perfect as they could (to try and outdo their neighbors) and would have annual competitions for the most perfect yard of paper poppies.

The True Story of the Whole World

Where did we come from? Where are we going? What does this all mean? These are questions whose answers form the framework of a worldview. A worldview is a grand story of the world crafted to makes sense of the world. So then, our lives are informed by story. We all have a reigning story in our minds of the world that colors the way we perceive ourselves, others and the events that unfold around us. Yet there is only one Story that is perfectly true. It is the Story that all good stories imitate and whisper. It is the biblical Story. The true Story of the whole world.

Look & Live: Ephesians 2:1-3

And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience—among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. Ephesians 2:1-3

The Adoration of the Unadorned

The life to which you have been called by God is one of anonymity. It is one that not only suggests but demands a persistent humility before God and others. This type of humility is not simply willed into existence. It is not forged by human exertion. It is gifted from the Spirit of God in having eyes to see supreme beauty in the humiliation of Christ and being stirred to go and do likewise for others. If in this life you welcome this humility, you will find your eternal exaltation. The kingdom of God will welcome in adoration the unadorned. Yet if you seek exaltation in this life, you will have it only for a season and be left to embrace eternal humiliation.

Look & Live: Ephesians 1:22-23

And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.  Ephesians 1:22-23

Though the Fig Tree Should Not Blossom

I am 28 years old, married for almost 6 years, I have a 2 year old son, and I am a high school teacher at Duluth. To many, the obvious answers to “what is your identity” are male, husband, father, teacher.  But let’s probe a little deeper. I like to think of identity as a Jenga tower. All of the different things that we do, like, and want are all pieces of the tower. Some of my other “pieces” would be “Georgia Bulldog fan,” “tennis player,” “father to a son who goes to college,” etc. Many of the things that I find my identity in are future things. If you are having trouble putting your finger on what makes up your “identity,” think about it this way: what are you scared of losing?

Planned Parenthood, Racism & The Greater Evil

How do we wage war against atrocities that leave us paralyzed in silent devastation? How do we rise up against injustice that cripples us under its unspeakably heavy burden? These are questions I have grappled with in the wake of what is now five videos that clearly and undeniably implicate top level Planned Parenthood in the sell-for-profit of God’s image bearers whose lives have been sacrificed on the altar of convenience.

Look & Live: Ephesians 1:11-14

"In him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of his glory. In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory."

Confession, The Reality of Sin & The Hope of the Gospel

When it comes to sin, the church has made a tragic, even fatal, habit of treating malignant tumors with band aids. We play with nuclear bombs like they are snap pops. Nowhere is this evidenced more than in our unwillingness to drag the darkness of our sin into the liberating light of the gospel. When we refuse to confess our sin, we are saying that sin is not really as serious and the forgiveness of the cross is not really as free as the Bible says. In other words, where confession is lacking, self-righteousness is still reigning.