Category: Informing the Reforming

Blog can be found on:

www.challies.com

Brief Biography

Proper introductions begin with names, so let me tell you how to pronounce mine. It’s pronounced CHALL-eez and rhymes with “valleys” and “rallies.” It’s quite simple, really, but is almost always the first question I’m asked.

I am a Christian, a husband to Aileen and a father to three children aged 10 to 16. I worship and serve as an elder at Grace Fellowship Church in Toronto, Ontario. I am a book reviewer, co-founder of Cruciform Press, and have written five books:

The Discipline of Spiritual Discernment (Crossway, 2007)
Sexual Detox: A Guide For Guys Who Are Sick of Porn (Cruciform Press, 2010)
The Next Story: Life and Faith After the Digital Explosion (Zondervan, 2011)
Do More Better: A Practical Guide to Productivity (Cruciform Press, 2015)
Visual Theology: Seeing and Understanding the Truth About God (Zondervan, 2016)

I began this web site in 2002 and have been writing here daily since 2003. It is my place to think out loud and in public while also sharing some of the interesting things I’ve discovered in my online travels.

By micoots
28/01/2017 0

God Hates Pride

Is there any trait more deceptive? Is there any vice easier to see in others, but harder to see in ourselves? We despise its presence in them, but defend its presence in us. It is the ugly trait of pride, one of a number of traits for which God has a special disgust. In this series, we are looking at things God says he hates, he despises, or he considers an abomination. We have already seen that God hates idolatry, sexual immorality, injustice, hypocrisy, and deceit. Today we will look at God’s ..

By micoots
27/01/2017 0

How I Use Mind Mapping Software

Much of life is an attempt to bring order from chaos. The pastor who sets out to prepare a sermon fills his mind with information and then needs to arrange it according to a unified theme. The author who sets out to write a book collects information from a hundred sources and then needs to lay it out in a logical manner. Ministries, marketing campaigns, fundraising drives, and even family vacations begin as chaos and eventually come to a state of order. A tool I have found especially helpful in ..

By micoots
27/01/2017 0

A La Carte (January 27)

Today’s Kindle deals include The Faith of Christopher Hitchens, an interesting and excellent book. There are also a number of titles related to abortion.

Logos has put together a list of their most popular products for 2016. Quite a lot of them are for sale, so it’s worth giving the list a look.

The Awkward 17th-Century Dating Practice
If you’ve ever read about Jonathan Edwards, you’ve read about the bizarre practice of bundling. Atlas Obscura has just written a great article on a dumb practic..

By micoots
26/01/2017 0

Do Children Have a Financial Obligation Toward Their Parents?

Crash Course Philosophy has more than 5 million subscribers, making it one of the most popular YouTube channels. They recently shared a video titled “Family Obligations” in which they explain the view of American philosopher Jane English that grown children have no obligation to their parents and should feel no duty to care for them or even to remain in relationship. Essentially, because children do not choose to be born, they bear no obligation toward the people who chose to conceive them (or, ..

By micoots
24/01/2017 0

Final Call (January 24)

Welcome to Final Call, a brief, hand-picked selection of news, articles, videos, and curiosities from the Internet and beyond. Today, each of the items has a common theme: 2017.

Two Documentaries
2017 is going to bring two promising documentaries that will be of particular interest to Reformed folk. Both debuted their trailers at the recent G3 Conference. The first is Calvinist, by Les Lanphere.

The second is Luther by Stephen McCaskell.

I’ve been tracking these productions for a while now, a..

By micoots
24/01/2017 0

Aging Brings Life-Shaping Decisions

I remember watching the commercial as a child. A man dressed for work sprints after a moving bus, trying desperately to flag it down before it drives off without him. In a flash, he is transported to a beach where he meets his future self, jogging under the morning sun. His future self looks over and asks, “Still in the rat race?” “Hey, you’re me!,” he replies. His future self is retired, healthy, free. “Retirement agrees with me.” “Retirement? How can we afford that?” The answer? “Freedom 55.”
..

By micoots
23/01/2017 0

Greater Age Brings Greater Responsibility

Aging is a universal reality in this world, for as time progresses, we progress with it. Aging brings many sorrows as we face greater exposure to the sin that lives within us and the sin that pollutes everything around us. Aging also brings many joys as we experience God’s rich blessings, and especially as we receive greater exposure to his renewing work. If sorrows are inevitable, is there a way of living that can diminish their impact? Is there something we can do so that these sorrows do not ..

By micoots
22/01/2017 0

Weekend A La Carte (January 28)

Today’s Kindle deals include:

This Day in 1499. 518 years ago today Katherine von Bora, a German nun who married Martin Luther, was born. She was 26 and Luther 41 the day they were married. *

Flashback

I grant you that true repentance is never too late, but I warn you at the same time, late repentance is seldom true.—J.C. Ryle

By micoots
22/01/2017 0

5 Marks of a Good Funeral

I have been to good funerals and bad funerals. In fact, I’ve been to beautiful funerals and full-out dreadful ones. What distinguishes the best from the worst? In How to Finish the Christian Life, Don and George Sweeting offer their observations on the best ceremonies they have attended and officiated. Here are their five marks of a good funeral.

A good funeral is understandable and faith-building. That is, the funeral has been prepared in such a way that it is understandable to seasoned church..

By micoots
21/01/2017 0

God Hates Deceit

If we are to be people who love, we must also be people who hate. If we are to love what blesses people, we must hate what harms them. In loving and hating in these ways, we imitate the God who both loves and hates. God reserves words like “hate,” “abomination,” and “despise” to describe the sins for which he has the greatest revulsion. We have already seen that God hates idolatry, sexual immorality, injustice, and hypocrisy. In this article we see God’s hatred for deceit.

God Hates Deceit
The ..