The Gospel Coalition | TLG Christian News

Preacher’s Toolkit: How Should I Respond When I Deliver a Dud?

06/02/2017 0 Comment

Editors’ note: “Preacher’s Toolkit” is a monthly series that seeks to answer questions related to preaching. If you have a preaching-related question or issue you’d like for us to answer, please write us at ask@thegospelcoalition.org. We recently launched an Expository Preaching Project, for which TGC Council pastors will prepare free instructional resources on expository preaching in both video and print formats in six strategic languages. We’re prayerfully seeking to raise $150,000 to fund the..

Campus Ministries Race to Keep Up with Record Number of International Students

05/02/2017 0 Comment

In 2005, flush with revenue from $100-plus barrels of oil, the Saudi Arabian government set up a $6 billion scholarship fund.

The program covers full tuition, medical insurance, living expenses, and airfare for both undergraduate and graduate students. The only catch: students are required to study at one of the world’s top 100 universities, or enroll in a top-50 program.

Ever since, the number of Saudi students coming to study in the United States has steadily risen, from about 3,400 in 2005–..

My Crisis on a Cliff

05/02/2017 0 Comment

The city is situated between two juts of rock, helpfully called East Rock and West Rock. On the flat plane beneath these two small hills, the houses and roads span out to the coast, and from the top of either rock you can see the city spread before you, reaching out to the sea. When you’re in the city, you would hardly know it’s on the edge of the coastline, but when you’re up high and look out, you’re reminded that the city is coastal indeed. East Rock is more populated, easier to access, and t..

Women, We’re Co-Workers, Not Competitors

05/02/2017 0 Comment

My mom didn’t work at an office, but she wasn’t a “stay-at-home” mom. After my brothers and I started school, she was rarely “at home.” Instead, she was volunteering in our classrooms, visiting sick neighbors at hospitals, taking meals to new parents, and organizing logistics for the funerals of loved ones.

Her unpaid work wasn’t just a gift to our family—which, of course, it was. It was also a gift to our community. She didn’t see our home as the end of her work, but as the means by which she ..

One Church’s Story of Resettling a Syrian Refugee Family

05/02/2017 0 Comment

In December 2015, a group from Grace Toronto Church gathered together to help global refugees. Like the rest of the world, they had been horrified by the image of 3-year-old Aylan Kurdi, who had washed up on Turkish shores as his family tried reaching Canada. The small group researched the process of sponsoring a Syrian refugee family in Canada. On June 7, 2016, after months of waiting (and raising the legally required $30,000 for settlement), they received an email that a Syrian mother and fath..

How I Gleaned Hope from the Darkest Psalm

04/02/2017 0 Comment

After a recent talk I gave, an attendee shared that Psalm 88 was her favorite psalm. For those of us familiar with it, we might hear such a comment and raise our eyebrows in confusion.

Psalm 88? Really?

Psalm 88 isn’t a feel-good, everything-will-be-all-right kind of psalm. In fact, it’s the darkest one. If we put it to music, it’d be set to the tune of a sad country song—if not a funeral dirge. Hear the despair of the psalmist’s words:

O LORD, God of my salvation, I cry out day and night bef..

Coaching to Make Great Men, Not Just Great Players

03/02/2017 0 Comment

Todd Abernethy is an assistant basketball coach for the University of Mississippi. He is married to Micah, and they have two daughters, Ruthie and Maria, and one son, Jack.

How would you describe your work?

God has called me to be a coach. As a player, I had 10 to 12 head coaches from whom I learned the good, the bad, and the ugly of coaching. Today I use what I’ve learned to teach my guys how to be good players—and, more importantly, great men. We teach them to play as a team, work together, ..

A Children’s Book About Homosexuality

03/02/2017 0 Comment

Richard Peck is a prolific author of various kinds of fiction. He has received multiple awards, especially for his fiction aimed at children and young adults. Peck’s popularity means his latest children’s book is likely to be read widely, not least becasue it deals with homosexuality and gay marriage.

The Best Man tells the story of Archer Magill as he navigates home and school life between 1st and 6th grades. He’s a boy whose heroes are close to home. He wants to be like his grandpa, the great..

You Don’t Find Community by Looking for It

03/02/2017 0 Comment

You can learn a lot about a church from its website.

Not long ago I researched a church in another state, and I could tell it cares about community. From the small groups offered to the pictures of smiling people drinking coffee together, this congregation clearly works hard to make connections. After watching a few online interviews, it was obvious they value friendship.

Sadly, it wasn’t obvious they value Christ. I imagine they do. They’re a church, after all. But it wasn’t plain from anyth..

Whom Do You Serve—the Dragon or the Lamb?

02/02/2017 0 Comment

A friend quipped as he was finishing seminary that when asked his post-graduation plans, he would respond, “I’m going to be a celebrity pastor.” While his tongue-in-cheek remark brought laughs, it reminded of a real temptation leaders face.

Five years ago, pastor Jamin Goggin and theologian Kyle Strobel began to see this temptation in their own lives, and noted how an unhealthy desire for power superseded their devotion to Christ. This began their journey to understand where true kingdom power ..