Grace Blogs

ChristianAudio.com is having a $9.49 sale on lots of downloadable books from June 13-22.

One notable inclusion in that list is the The Listener’s Bible NIV, narrated by Max McLean. If you don’t have a Bible you can listen to, here’s a great chance to pick one up at almost 90% off. This is no cheesy production — I have McLean’s ESV reading and it’s fantastic. I highly recommend McLean’s work.

Some others:

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A number of Evangelicals have jointly issued An Evangelical Manifesto. Here’s an excerpt:

All too often we have trumpeted the gospel of Jesus, but we have replaced biblical truths with therapeutic techniques, worship with entertainment, discipleship with growth in human potential, church growth with business entrepreneurialism, concern for the church and for the local congregation with expressions of the faith that are churchless and little better than a vapid spirituality, meeting real needs with pandering to felt needs, and mission principles with marketing precepts. In the process we have become known for commercial, diluted, and feel-good gospels of health, wealth, human potential, and religious happy talk, each of which is indistinguishable from the passing fashions of the surrounding

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Boys will be boys… there’s a time and a place for giving the Y chromosome its due. But CNN has a piece titled “Why He Needs a Room of His Own” featuring these glimpses into American domestic life (emphasis added):

Sal Guarisco, a 51-year-old sales manager from Atlanta, negotiated a mantuary with his wife, Wendy… “It’s a place to decompress so that by the weekend you’re not hiding out,” Sal says…”Sal has a lot he needs to escape from, so it’s good that he has a place to go,” says Wendy…

Jill Scully, 31, of Pescadero, California, doesn’t sneak up on fiancé Nicholas Woodman, 32, in his lair, a barn outfitted with $13,000 of race car simulation

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There is only one reason to be a Christian: because it’s true. —Francis Schaeffer

Toward the end of the “Does God Exist?” teaching from April 20 (which was re-recorded and includes extra material we didn’t cover in church—call it the “director’s cut”), I offered the following “either/or” version of the Gospel:

Either God exists, or he doesn’t. The Gospel says he exists, so… Either we’re accountable to him for our lives, or we’re not. The Gospel says we’re accountable to God for our lives, so… Either we’re in trouble with God, or we’re not. The Gospel says we’re in trouble, so… Either God offers forgiveness, or he doesn’t. The Gospel says he offers forgiveness through faith in Jesus …

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So first she tasted the porridge of the Great, Huge Bear, and that was too hot for her; and she said a bad word about that. And then she tasted the porridge of the Middle Bear, and that was too cold for her; and she said a bad word about that too. And then she went to the porridge of the Little, Small, Wee Bear, and tasted that;and that was neither too hot nor too cold, but just right; and she liked it so well she ate it all up…

Last week’s “God Question” about the existence of God got into some deep science that hopefully didn’t lose too many people. I wanted to follow up on that by

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Douglas Groothuis quotes evolutionary biologist Richard Lewontin on the evolution-at-all-costs attitude present in much of modern science. Lewontin says,

We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs, in spite of its failure to fulfill many of its extravagant promises of health and life, in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism. It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes

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Yesterday’s “God Question” about the existence of God was certainly jam-packed, and I have one huge regret when it comes to points that didn’t make it into the discussion:

You start with the Gospel. You follow up with apologetics.

Here’s what I mean: giving people reasons to believe in God is great, but believing in God is not the same as following Christ. James 2:19 says that “Even the demons believe—and shudder!”

It is far better, then, to lead with the Gospel—that we are created by God and accountable to him; we have broken his laws and stand condemned; that God has made a way for our guilt to be paid for and our crimes forgiven through Jesus Christ; and

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This week’s “God Question” is “Why do you believe God even exists?” In a bit of good timing, Stand to Reason has started posting some of Greg Koukl’s podcast commentary as YouTube videos, and one of the first asks the question, “Can God’s Existence Be Proved?”

Skip down to the video if you’d like, but before diving into this question it’s worth establishing what is meant by “proof,” at least in a philosophical sense:

1. You must have at least two premises and a conclusion.
2. The conclusion must logically follow from the premises.
3. Each premise must be true, or at least, more probable than the opposite.

Accept the Argument, or Say Something Silly: Your Choice

The trick is that someone who really …

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One of the main points to remember about our “God Questions” series is that we are seeking to show that Christianity provides a coherent worldview that adequately answers the full range of life’s greatest questions.

It’s a clear sign that you need to rethink your position if you have to use one way of thinking to answer a certain set of questions, but then switch to a different way of thinking to answer others. Case in point: in 2006, Richard Dawkins (The God Delusion) was asked about the consistency of his views as an atheist, and it looks like he knows his worldview doesn’t work:

Questioner: …You

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Prayer took much of the time and strength of Jesus, and a man or woman who does not spend much time in prayer cannot properly be called a follower of Jesus Christ.

—R. A. Torrey, How to Pray

I often get down on myself for not reading my Bible like I ought to. But recently, I’ve started to think my real problem is that I don’t pray like I ought to.

Frequency of Prayer

What is the “right” amount of prayer? For me, “more than I’m doing right now” will do for an answer, and I suspect few of us have people saying to us, “Praying again? You know, you really ought to cut down…”

In the first chapter of the book quoted above, …

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