Mortification: A Prayer

 

Mortification

from The Valley of Vision: A collection of Puritan Prayers & Devotions by Arthur Bennett

 

O DIVINE LAWGIVER,
I take shame to myself
for open violations of thy law,
for my secret faults,
my omissions of duty,
my unprofitable attendance upon means of grace,
my carnality in worshipping thee,
and all the sins of my holy things.

Zeal, or Arrogance?

Here are two excellent (and convicting) articles. There is much work to be done in our churches, and zeal is a good thing... but it is so easy for zeal to become tainted with arrogance, and for people to define themselves by what they're against, and for new meaningless traditions to take the place of old meaningless traditions. Check these out:

The new religious fundamentalists? Millennial Christians.

The Arrogance of My Generation’s Church Leaders

Evangelism and Discipleship

Alan Hirsch hits the nail on the head when he says that discipleship and not evangelism needs to be our focus.

Of course, if our mentality is that "evangelism" and "discipleship" are things that we do, then we will find ourselves struggling to balance the two. But if we are being and making disciples, then evangelism will happen naturally in the process.

What do you think? Agree or disagree?

Guidelines for Social Media

Have you ever posted something on social media that you later regretted? Maybe it was sarcastic, or inappropriate, or just plain mean. Or maybe it would have been okay to share if your best friends were the only ones who could see your feed, but it wasn't necessarily something you needed to share with the public.

I've been there. Quite recently, in fact. And afterwards I realized it was time to seriously think through some guidelines for social media.


These are some questions that I am going to use to evaluate the things I post on social media. I'm sharing them in the hopes that you might find them useful, too.