Links & Quotes

No one wants what the gloomy person has. Joy is a Christian’s testimony—it’s what attracts others to Jesus! Check out this full message from my series on the Songs of Ascent.

I have lots of new content every week, which you can check out on my YouTube channel.

“At first glance, people may not see how these different forms of sexual violence connect to each other. But, in fact, experts are increasingly recognizing that they may all stem from one common source—sexual objectification. Sexual objectification occurs when people perceive others as sex objects rather than complex human beings deserving of dignity and respect.” Pornography is a major contributor to the sexual objectification which leads to sexual violence.

Dr. Brian Thomas describes why fossils are found where they are and why land animals may even be found near marine animals: “This fossil discovery [a bone from a South American megaraptor found near Cape Otway, Australia] fits well with a biblical history, which goes something like this: Around 2348 BC, a worldwide flood crushed and reshaped the earth’s surface, breaking up a single landmass (Pangaea) into continents and fossilizing countless living things. Prior to the Flood megaraptors roamed Pangaea, during the Flood they were fossilized, and in the late Flood stages the boundaries of new continents (along with their fossils) were roughly shaped. Unlike the standard story, the outlines of this history have been testified to by reliable eyewitnesses, and this testimony has been faithfully preserved in Genesis.”

“The more we let God take over us, the more truly ourselves we become—because He made us.” —C.S. Lewis

J. Warner Wallace shares two trends in American society that are contributing to the decline of religious adherence in America.

“There is no way around hard work. Embrace it.” —Roger Federer

Shame on my thoughts, how they stray from me!
During the Psalms, they wander on a path that is not right; they run, they distract…
One moment they follow the ways of loveliness, and the next the ways of riotous shame…
Swiftly they leap in one bound from earth to heaven…
O beloved Christ… may the grace of the sevenfold Spirit come to keep them in check!
Rule this heart of mine, O swift God of the elements, that You may be my love, and I may do Your will! —Anonymous, On the Flightiness of Thought, Irish, 8th-9th century

Ungodly leaders become more and more selfish, while shepherd leaders become more and more God-fearing and more and more attentive to the needs of others (Jeremiah 12:10-11). Check out my series of posts for godly leaders and my book Shepherd Leadership.

Links & Quotes

You are more likely to act yourself into good feelings than you are to feel yourself into action. Leaders need to get moving and keep moving! Check out this full conversation from The Craig and Greg Show.

I have lots of new content every week, which you can check out on my YouTube channel.

In news that’s not surprising at all, many recent paleontological discoveries confirm to exactly what would be expected if we take the biblical account of Creation and a global Flood literally.

John Piper was asked to weigh-in on the value of repetitive phrases in worship songs. He said, “The issue’s not repetition per se but whether there is enough substance, enough rich content of truth about God woven into the repetitions to justify them, to warrant them. That’s the issue. There’s a difference between repetitions that are called forth by the repeated crescendo of new, glorious truth, and repetitions that serve as a kind of mantra without sufficient truth that is simply used to sustain or intensify a mood. Moods in worship should be awakened and sustained primarily by truth, assisted by music—not primarily by music with a little truth thrown in to justify the singing.”

Pastor John Piper used Psalm 136 as an example in the post above. T.M. Moore also shared this thought about Psalm 136: “The term most frequently used to describe this everywhere-present-and-always-at-work love of God is translated as ‘lovingkindness’ or, in some versions, ‘steadfast love.’ Especially Psalm 136, with its antiphonal arrangement of verses, insists that the cosmos is upheld, sustained, and pervaded by the lovingkindness of God. … It would improve our learning to pray without ceasing if we simply took some time out during the day to thank the Lord for the many ways His steadfast love surrounds, sustains, and swarms us at every moment!”

“When people refer to a man as a man of the Book, meaning the Bible, he’s generally found to be a man of multitudinous books, which simply isolates the one Book to its proper grandeur. The man who reads only the Bible does not as a rule know it or human life.” —Oswald Chambers

Men’s Health magazine shared an interview with Jeremy Renner, who was nearly killed in a tragic accident. I love his attitude about making today better than yesterday. His words remind me of a poem my grandma used to use to motivate me to keep “besting” what I had already done.

Christopher Ash writes about reading the Psalms through the lens of Jesus. He concludes this way: “I remember seeing on the wall of a church the words of Psalm 20:4: ‘May [the Lord] grant you your heart’s desire and fulfill all your plans!’ How wonderful, you might think. The Bible promises me all that my heart desires. Until you read the psalm and realize that Psalm 20 is a prayer for the king in David’s line. Ultimately, it is a prayer that Jesus will have His heart’s desire granted and that His plans will be fulfilled. And they will! The Psalms are not all about me. If I think they are, I will end up disillusioned. But when I grasp that they are all about Christ, my heart lifts in joy that He is the blessed Man and I belong to Him.”

God’s Plan For You Stands Firm

By the word of the Lord the heavens were made, and by the breath of His mouth all their lights. … For He spoke, and it was done; He commanded, and it stood firm. (Psalm 33:6, 9) 

We literally live in, on, and through the breath of God. Everything was created as God spoke them into existence—including you and me. 

Let’s personalize verse 9, making it our prayer and our declaration: 

“For He spoke my name, and it was done; He commanded the plan for my life, and it stands firm even today!” 

God created you on purpose and for a purpose. He knew exactly what He was doing when He breathed life into you, and His plan still stands firm. You are invaluable in God’s perfect plan❣️

Here’s another post and video where I talk about purpose more: Blessed To Be A Blessing. 

And this is a powerful prayer for you to pray for yourself—Still Being Fashioned. 

Links & Quotes

This is the intro to an exclusive video for my Patreon supporters. Your support would be so helpful and you will get some cool stuff too!

I have lots of new content every week, which you can check out on my YouTube channel.

I’m proud to be a part of the Assembly of God fellowship that has its roots in missions. Alice Luce is a great example of a missions pioneer whose work in the 1920s is still bearing fruit today. 

“Our nation’s founding document declared independence from Britain, but, with equal fervor, declared dependence upon God. Expressing ‘firm reliance on the Protection of divine Providence,’ the signers committed the American experiment to their Maker. The Spirit of 1776 was reverence and trust. So, as we mark this solemn occasion, let us seek a rebirth of true liberty, which is possible only when governed by divine law. For, without God, we can never have ‘liberty and justice for all.’” —Chuck Colson

“It is impossible to describe the abundance of peace and heavenly joy that often flows into my soul by means of the fresh answers which I have obtained from God, after waiting upon him for help and blessing; and the longer I have had to wait upon him, or the greater my need, the greater the enjoyment when at last the answer comes, which has often been in a very remarkable way, in order to make the hand of God the more manifest.” —George Mueller 

The Institute for Creation Research reports on a study: “Physicists at Roskilde University in Denmark have shown that a single equation correctly describes the frequency of wing and fin strokes for a wide array of flying and swimming creatures, including birds, insects, bats, and whales.” Wow, it’s almost as if an all-wise Creator knew what He was doing!

T.M. Moore uses the understanding of wireless internet access to help Christians with a picture of prayer. “When we bend our increasingly Christ-filled minds, hearts, and consciences to the spiritual code-writing of prayer, we craft messages which shape the spiritual air as they course their way toward the Source of all living-water spiritual power, Who is filling all things with Himself. The more we pray with Christ-overflowing souls, the more we flood the spiritual airspace with the Lord, crowding out and sidelining those forces of wickedness which seek to jam those airwaves or fill them with spiritual disinformation. And the less spiritual ‘airspace’ the devil can command, the better for all of us.” —T.M. Moore 

Links & Quotes

Godly men honor their wives by having eyes only for them. Fellas, if you find your eyes wandering you need to tell yourself, “That’s not mine!” and then quickly put your eyes back where they belong. Check out my full message to men on Father’s Day.

I have lots of new content every week, which you can check out on my YouTube channel.

From a recent article at The Institute for Creation Research: “Astronomers using the James Webb Space Telescope have recently confirmed that two galaxies are extremely distant, with one becoming the new record holder as the most distant galaxy from Earth. … By uniformitarian reckoning, this galaxy existed just 290 million years after the supposed Big Bang, yet it looks too mature for its age. … This new record-breaker is just the latest example of the ‘distant mature galaxy problem’ that has long plagued the Big Bang model.” These galaxies are all the masterpiece of one Creator! Here is another resource from a biblical perspective that outlines what the “in the beginning” moment (Genesis 1:1) may have looked like.

“Give me the preacher who opens the folds of my heart; who accuses me, convicts me, and condemns me before God; who loves my soul too well to suffer me to go on in sin, unreproved, through fear of giving me offence; who draws the line with accuracy, between the delusions of fancy, and the impressions of grace; who pursues me from one hiding place to another, until I am driven from every refuge of lies; who gives me no rest until he sees me, with unfeigned penitence, trembling at the feet of Jesus; and then, and not till then, soothes my anguish, wipes away my tears, and comforts me with the cordials of grace.” —Samuel Pearce

Matthew Emadi writes, “The New Testament quotes Psalm 110 more than any other Old Testament passage. The apostles and the early church loved Psalm 110 for its majestic depiction of the Lord Jesus Christ and His reign over all nations.” Here’s how to read Psalm 110 in light of the words and works of Jesus.

J. Warner Wallace, at a Q&A session, answers questions about why some Bible translators have marked a couple of passages as unreliable, and why some books that claim to be authentic accounts aren’t included in the canon of Scripture. 

I always love when archeological discoveries confirm once again the historicity of the Bible! Here is an archeological biography of Esarhaddon.

“So the writer [of the Book of Hebrews] urges his readers, as part of being faithful to Him Who called them, to consider Jesus, to strive for the glory of Jesus, and to fix their minds on Jesus as the key to knowing daily strength for faithfulness (Hebrews 12:1-2). What does this entail? … The writer of Hebrews admits that he learned to look to Jesus by paying attention to those who had known Him, listening carefully to their words, and laying hold on them with faith (Hebrews 2:1-4). As he heard the apostles and studied the Scriptures of the Old Testament, the picture of Jesus presented there began to become increasingly clear. … The lesson is plain: Jesus is being revealed in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament. Wherever we read or study in the Scripture, Jesus is present, making Himself known. We can see Jesus throughout the Bible, and consider Him as He is presented to us, in all His majesty, beauty, and power. Our responsibility is to read the Bible in such a way as to recognize what God is revealing about His Apostle and our High Priest, Jesus Christ.” —T.M. Moore

Links & Quotes

Fellas, the godly superwomen in our lives have unlocked our leadership potential. What are you going to do with that? You have only two choices: steward it or squander it. We only honor these godly women when we steward that potential well. Watch the full Father’s Day sermon here.

I have lots of new content every week, which you can check out on my YouTube channel.

Dan Reiland addresses an important topic for busy leaders: busy work vs. real work. “Doing the easy stuff makes us feel good, doing the hard stuff helps other people live better. When we focus on our real work over busywork, we see intentional progress toward a focused vision or goal, rather than just checking things off a list.” Check out the four things Dan calls leaders to focus on. 

“Because of what Jesus did for us through His life, death, and resurrection, we are no longer the worst things we have ever done. We are now the best thing God has ever done for us! That’s what God saved us from. That is our history. Now the question is, what has God saved us for? That is our destiny!“ —Jim Wiegand, in the Everything Begins With Purpose reading plan on YouVersion

A good reminder for pastors. “Call your own soul often to account; examine the temper, the frame, and the motions of your heart with all holy severity, so that the evidences of your faith in Jesus, and your repentance for sin, and your conversion to God, be many and fair, be strong and unquestionable; that you may walk on with courage and joyful hope toward heaven, and lead on the flock of Christ thither with holy assurance and joy.” —Isaac Watts

“The fellow who never makes a mistake takes his orders from one who does.” —Herbert Brocknow

“‘The fear the Lord.’ This refers to an awesome respect for God, which is a good thing. Without it, people are presumptuous before God. Those who do not fear God fail to respect His awesome power and righteousness, and they do not recognize the infinite distance between their sins and His holiness.“ —Quest Study Bible commentary on Psalm 128:1

“Our Lord did not ask us to give up the things of earth, but to exchange them for better things.” —Fulton J. Sheen

“Abortion advocates have long labeled humans in the earliest stages of development as ‘nothing but’ clumps of cells. This description is like calling Michelangelo’s David ‘a clump of marble.’ The only difference is that while art historians know every detail of this statuary masterpiece, scientists are still unlocking the secrets of the embryo.” John Stonestreet shares some astounding new research about the ways that the cells of a baby develop in a way that can only be attributed to an All-Wise Creator. 

The unrighteous always seek to pull down those who hold to God’s righteous standard. How sad that they think it easier to pull the righteous down than to repent of their own evil. God sees this: He rewards the righteous who do not compromise and He punishes the unrepentant unrighteous who try to force the righteous to compromise.

The Fullness Of God’s Glory

And one [angel] called out to another and said, “Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord of armies. The whole earth is full of His glory.” And the foundations of the thresholds trembled at the voice of him who called out, while the temple was filling with smoke. Then I said, “Woe to me, for I am ruined! Because I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of armies.” (Isaiah 6:3-5) 

The literal translation of the phrase “the whole part is full of His glory” is, “The fullness of the whole earth IS His glory.” 

Paul says it this way, “All things have been created through Him [Jesus] and for Him. He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together” (Colossians 1:16-17). God spoke all things into existence—we literally live today in His breath, we breathe His breath, we eat His breath. All that exists is the fullness of His glory. 

Isaiah got a small glimpse of this glory, and the weightiness of God’s awesome glory brought him to his knees (Isaiah 6:4-5). 

How many trivial things would fall to the side when we realize how unimportant they are in comparison to the eternal importance of God’s glory! 

How differently we would live each day if we were aware of God’s presence in and around us! 

How fearful we would be to even contemplate sinning in His presence! 

How quick we would be to repent of sin when we are aware of just how present He is! 

How unafraid we would be to boldly stand for God and proclaim His love and power if we were aware of His ever-present Spirit equipping and supporting us! 

Oh, that “the Father of glory may give you a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him” (Ephesians 1:17)! 

You may also want to check out:

Links & Quotes

I can forgive the inexcusable in others because God has forgiven the inexcusable in me. Check out this whole message here. I have lots of new content every week, which you can check out on my YouTube channel.

In the fourth year of King Hezekiah, which was the seventh year of Hoshea son of Elah, king of Israel, Shalmaneser king of Assyria came up against Samaria and besieged it (2 Kings 18:9). The Bible Archeology Report puts together wonderful biographies of biblical characters based on archeological discoveries that corroborate the account in Scripture. Here is the biography of Assyrian King Shalmaneser V. 

Meteorologist Dr. Roy Spencer writes, “Atmospheric CO2 levels will start to fall even with modest reductions in anthropogenic CO2 emissions. Why is that? The reason is due to something called the CO2 ‘sink rate.’ It has been observed that the more CO2 there is in the atmosphere, the more quickly nature removes the excess.” Imagine that! It’s almost as if the Creator of the Universe knew exactly what He was doing.

J. Warner Wallace makes the case that the origin of the universe points to a Creator—but he does so without using Scripture.

“You will not be able to extemporize good thinking unless you have been in the habit of thinking and feeding your mind with abundant and nourishing food.” —Charles Spurgeon

Links & Quotes

We’ve added things that we think should be in our prayer vocabulary. But kingdom praying should be as natural as talking to the most loving Father you can imagine! Check out more thoughts in my series of posts called Kingdom Praying. I have lots of new content every week, which you can check out on my YouTube channel.

“Obstacles don’t have to stop you. If you run into a wall, don’t turn around and give up. Figure out how to climb it, go through it, or work around it.” —Michael Jordan

In the post-Flood rock layers, fossils are often found of animals that were much larger than are currently observed. This has been called giantism. “Evolutionists claim that adaption occurs as random mutations make some organisms better fitted for their environment, and the less-fit organisms then die off. … This supposed, random, trial-and-error process requires long periods of time waiting for the ‘right’ random mutation to occur. In contrast, ICR gives credit to Jesus. He designed organisms with built-in sensors that enable them to detect changes in their environment. Internal genetic programming then allows these organisms to rapidly adapt to these changes in predictable ways. Such adaptation is often too rapid for natural selection to be the correct explanation. This design-based paradigm of adaptation is called continuous environmental tracking (CET).” This is an excellent article. 

“If the stone falls on the pot, alas, for the pot; if the pot falls on the stone, alas for the pot.” —Jewish proverb, based on Psalm 118:22 and Luke 20:17-18

Godly leaders need…

  • …ears consecrated to hear God’s voice and the voice of the people
  • …hands dedicated to ministering in love and obedience
  • …feet that only walk in God-directed paths

Godly leaders don’t minister to please people, but to lead people to God. So godly leaders are ever aware that in all they do, they must hear God say, “Well done, good and faithful servant.”

Links & Quotes

Mental health tip: Stop beating yourself up because of what you did or didn’t do in the past. Learn from it and keep moving forward. Check out a whole series of posts and videos on a Christian’s mental healthI have lots of new content every week, which you can check out on my YouTube channel.

“God cannot part with His grace, or goodness, or strength, as an external thing that He gives us, as He gives the raindrops from heaven. No; He can only give it, and we can only enjoy it, as He works it Himself directly and unceasingly. And the only reason that He does not work it more effectually and continuously is, that we do not let Him. We hinder Him either by our indifference or by our self-effort, so that He cannot do what He would.” —Andrew Murray, Waiting on God 

The unlimited genius of our All-wise Creator is seen so clearly in the unique and beautiful design of each snowflake. Check out these amazing photographs!

“You don’t have to be a fantastic hero to do certain things—to compete. You can be just an ordinary chap, sufficiently motivated to reach challenging goals.” —Sir Edmund Hillary

Biblical archaeologist Joel Kramer takes viewers into a hidden cave to show them an ancient Christian inscription that offers direct extra-biblical, archaeological evidence for Jesus.