My Two Cents

Some men feel inadequate in their role as a father, so they withdraw and leave it to their wife to carry the load. Some men feel totally adequate in and of themselves to handle the upbringing of their children.“I got this,” they say to themselves before prayerlessly entering a room to shepherd their teen in […]

By God’s grace, we’ve printed 135,000 copies of the various Gospel Meditations devotionals. That’s a staggering number. How did it happen? What’s the backstory of the books? Well, it all began with Mother’s Day. It all began with Mother’s Day Churches often struggle to find “just the right gift” to give out to mothers each […]

The four Gospels provide infinite opportunities for the Christian to marvel. The words of Christ are captivating. The miracles of Christ are awe-inspiring. And we could go on, endlessly: the purity of Christ, the compassion of Christ, the humility of Christ, and so forth. I’m struck on this Good Friday by the passivity of Christ. […]

Billy Graham died yesterday. After 99 years on earth, right now he is seeing Jesus face to face. No doubt he also sees multitudes whom he told about Jesus. There’s no person in history who has preached the gospel to more people than Billy Graham. Not the Apostle Paul. Not George Whitefield. Nobody. So why […]

Church life can be messy. Any time you put sinners together—even redeemed sinners—there’s bound to be some friction. Sadly, many churches feel more like a war zone than a refuge. Much of the problem stems from our unwillingness to exercise the undervalued virtue of deference, what Colossians 3:13 calls “bearing with one another.” Conservative Christians […]

The incarnation is an audacious doctrine. The belief that the Creator of the universe “became flesh” is astonishing. An immeasurable chasm is fixed between the infinite God and finite man—and it was crossed when Jesus was born in a manger in Bethlehem! Understandably, this doctrine has stirred imaginations. The immortal God Whom heaven cannot contain—now […]

John Huss is one of my heroes. He was a faithful preacher who lived in Bohemia—what we know as the Czech Republic. His hometown of Prague is a magnificent place. I treasure the time I spent wandering through the old town, finding the church where he preached, and gazing on his large statue in the […]

The nature and purpose of preaching is something which should concern all Christians. If we attend Protestant churches, then the sermon stands at the very center of our worship service. While everything that happens in the worship service is important, the sermon is of singular significance. It is thus vital that both preacher and people […]

The psalmist commands us, “Sing to the Lord a new song. Then sing several familiar songs.” Okay, I made that last part up. Lest I be cursed for adding to Scripture, I’ll go ahead and recant. But I do think it’s good (albeit uninspired) advice. Let me explain. Several months ago a pastor friend asked […]

At the end of October, Protestants around the world give thanks to God for the Reformation, the sixteenth-century movement which reclaimed the glorious doctrine of salvation by grace from the obscuring veils of Roman traditions. On October 31, 1517, Martin Luther sounded the birth of the Reformation by posting his Ninety-Five Theses in protest of […]