Informing the Reforming

Blog can be found on:

www.challies.com

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.

A La Carte (January 10)

10/01/2017 0 Comment

Today’s Kindle deals include quite a few good books. B&H has many of their Perspectives titles on sale and they are worth checking out. Be sure to also consider Packer’s book on holiness and Matt Papa’s excellent Look and Live.

The Dangers of Acting Like You Are Married
There are certain dangers in acting married before you’re married. Jordan Standridge outlines some of them here.

Believing in the Somehow
Here’s a powerful, comforting article from Melissa Edgington. “We heard the unmistakable sound of human anguish. We walked over a few aisles and saw her sitting there, surrounded by a small crowd. Her weathered hands covered her face, and beneath her fingers, twisted with age, she cried out.”

I Got Gay Married. I Got Gay Divorced. I Regret Both.
Denny Burk points to and comments on an interesting article. “She admits that she and her partner never wanted the norms of marriage, but only the rights of marriage. As a result, she regrets her gay marriage only because it made breaking-u..

sixty-six books. one story. all about one name.

09/01/2017 0 Comment

This sponsored post was written and provided by The Jesus Bible.

During the reign of Augustus, a young, ordinary teenage girl gives birth to a baby. In the vast expanse of eternity’s story, she’s just one person in one chapter. But in her arms is the author!

Before he was laid in a manager, it was Jesus who laid out the foundations of the universe.

Before Jesus split the veil in two, he split the sea in two.

Before Jesus made a promise to his disciples, he made a promise to Abraham.

Before Jesus walked in the garden of Gethsemane, he walked in the Garden of Eden. Jesus is in Genesis.

Jesus is in Exodus. Jesus is in the prophets and the Psalms. Jesus is in Romans and Revelation. There was never a moment before him. And there will never be a moment without him.

There is no B.C.!

Encounter the living Jesus in all of Scripture. The Jesus Bible, NIV Edition, with exclusive articles from Louie Giglio, Max Lucado, John Piper, Ravi Zacharias, and Randy Alcorn, lifts Jesus up as the lea..

Big Sins Little Sins

09/01/2017 0 Comment

We know a big sin when we see one, right? We know the difference between depraved acts and mere peccadillos. We know that while all sin is the same in expressing rebellion against God, some sins show greater evidence of a hardened heart and bring more devastating consequences. In some ways all sin is the same and in some ways each sin is unique.

The big sin I address most often in my church and travels is the sin of pornography—men or women, boys or girls, who willingly and repeatedly seek out pornography as a means of sexual pleasure. I write this article particularly for the long line of young men and women who spoke to me after the student conference last week. We are battling a porn plague today and I’ve yet to find a Christian who is unconcerned about it, unconcerned about the consequences to individuals and to the church as a whole.

I think we all agree that looking at pornography is a big sin and for a number of reasons: it is vulgar, avoidable, indefensible, exploitive, and c..

Ask Me Anything (Gifting, Marriage in Heaven, Complementarianism, Family Devotions)

08/01/2017 0 Comment

Here is another edition of Ask Me Anything. Today we cover using gifts, death, marriage in heaven, family devotions, and the outworkings of complementarianism.

How do you balance using your gifts to edify the local church versus the universal church? Your blog has greatly edified me, but I wonder what your opinion is on striking the balance? Should you be more focused on your local church instead of blogging to benefit the universal church?

This is a question I’ve had to think about a fair bit over the years, and it came to a head in the summer of 2015. At that time I was a full-time associate pastor at Grace Fellowship Church and was also maintaining this site and all that goes with it. For several years I had been doing both but was coming to the realization that I was facing a breakdown if I didn’t choose between them. I talked it over with friends, family, and my fellow elders. In the end, I resigned my full-time position at the church, though I remained an elder.

It might seem ..

God Hates Injustice

07/01/2017 0 Comment

The God who loves what is good must not love what is evil. He must not even be ambivalent toward what is evil, what is harmful, what is destructive. He must hate it. The God of the Bible reveals himself as a God of love. But he also reveals himself as a God who hates. We have been looking at verses where the Bible employs words like “hate,” “abomination,” and “detestable,” and have seen that God hates idolatry and God hates sexual immorality. Today we turn our attention to this: God hates injustice.

God Hates Injustice
God rules this world, and he rules it in justice. “Righteousness and justice are the foundation of your throne; steadfast love and faithfulness go before you” (Psalm 89:14). God delegates authority and responsibility to us, beings made in his image, and he expects we will express justice on his behalf. “By me kings reign, and rulers decree what is just,” (Proverbs 8:15) and “He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, a..

Final Call (January 6)

06/01/2017 0 Comment

Welcome to Final Call, a brief, hand-picked selection of news, articles, videos, and curiosities from the Internet and beyond.

Only a Holy God
I’ve been listening to CityAlight for a couple of years now and have especially appreciated their song Jerusalem, which we’ve added to our repertoire at Grace Fellowship Church. I was thrilled to learn of their new album Only a Holy God and even more thrilled to discover how good it is. CityAlight is associated with St Paul’s Church in Castle Hill, Australia, and sings modern worship and original hymns that are suited to congregational worship. If you’re interested in checking out the new album, perhaps begin with Christ Is Mine Forevermore (the song, lyrics, and chord charts are at the link), then try Saved My Soul, then All My Ways Are Known To You. It’s all free at their site. I think you’ll enjoy it!

On Instagram
Daily Overview is a fascinating Instagram account that showcases our planet from above. It’s worth following! There is also now ..

Building Body Branches

06/01/2017 0 Comment

I love words, and I love to see words put to effective, creative use. Just this morning, as I was reading the gospel of Mark, I was struck anew by Jesus’s ability to paint pictures with words. “Behold, a sower went out to sow. And as he sowed…” So often he spoke in parables, word pictures, as a means of describing truth. In fact, he used parables so often that Mark could say, “He did not speak to them without a parable.” This is exaggeration, obviously, but exaggeration meant to make a point. Jesus loved words and loved to use them as a medium to present and display truth.

In our family devotions, we have been reading about some of the creative, artistic ways God describes his people, the church. He uses word pictures to help us understand who he is, who we are, and how we are to relate both to him and to one another. There are several metaphors that appear throughout the New Testament. At times the church is referred to as branches, at times as a body, and at other times as a buildin..

The Commandment We Forgot: Honoring the Dishonorable

05/01/2017 0 Comment

Today we continue this series on honoring our parents, the series that considers how we, as adults, can fulfill the fifth commandment. Behind it is the knowledge that few of us seriously consider the fifth commandment and how we can actively fulfill it, even after we have left our parents’ authority. We have been focusing on Deuteronomy 5:16: “Honor your father and your mother, as the LORD your God commanded you, that your days may be long, and that it may go well with you in the land that the LORD your God is giving you.” We have already seen that this commandment is not only for children. At every age, we owe our parents a debt of honor and this can can be expressed in a number of ways: forgiving our parents, speaking well of them, esteeming them publicly and privately, seeking their wisdom, supporting them, and providing for them.

Well and good. That’s straightforward enough when we have a good relationship with our parents, when they raised us well, when they loved and respected u..

A La Carte (January 5)

05/01/2017 0 Comment

Today’s Kindle deals include books by Paul Tripp and Christine Hoover, as well as a selection of general-market business books that may be of interest.

The One Trip to Plan for Your Family This Year
I’m getting really excited for the opening of the Museum of the Bible. Timothy Paul Jones writes about it here and interviews one of the key personnel. This is amazing: “This is the largest museum currently under construction in the world, so plan to block out a full day to see everything. Trust me, you will wish you had more time!”

A New Organ
Scientists have just discovered a new organ within the human body. Or, more properly, they’ve discovered that something they already knew about, the mesentery, ought to be classified as an organ. But here’s the problem: “Typically, anatomists classify organs not only by their continuity but also by a common function. The complete function of the mesentery remains a mystery.”

Am I Holy Enough to Take Communion?
Piper offers a helpful answer to a co..

Final Call (January 4)

04/01/2017 0 Comment

Welcome to Final Call, a brief, hand-picked selection of news, articles, videos, and curiosities from the Internet and beyond.

VidAngel, Hollywood, and the Future of Filtering
You may be familiar with the video service VidAngel since it has been in the news lately. VidAngel is a service that allows movies and television shows to be filtered to remove objectionable content—violence, sex, swearing, and so on. A number of Hollywood companies have launched a successful lawsuit which has shut down the service, at least for now. This clever video explains why they want to do this:

I haven’t ever used VidAngel since it’s not available in Canada. Even then, I’m not sure removing scenes of sex and nudity really changes the facts of the movie. That’s something I’ve been exploring in a group of articles I’ve gathered together as Sex on the Silver Screen. But there is room to disagree and Randy Alcorn, for whom I have much respect, writes of his appreciation for the service in “Why I Love VidAng..