Today is the 25th anniversary of Francis Schaeffer’s death. Lane Dennis, President of Crossway Books, has a moving and rich tribute at the Crossway Blog.

This is an advertisement for Piper Construction Company, and a public celebration of God’s goodness to us as a family.

Our kitchen got a makeover with Benjamin Piper’s eye for craftsmanship and beauty. If you live in or near the Twin Cities and need any kind of remodeling—from decks to attics to basements to kitchens to bathrooms—I am sold on this fellow’s workmanship. A wise (and skillful) son makes a glad father.

Here is where he started:

Here is where he finished:

He’s more than a contractor to two grateful parents. God is kind to us.

As long as we are drawing your attention to the ESV Study Bible Online, let me tell you one of the uses I make of it that you might not think of.

Reading through parts of the Old Testament can be heavy sledding—like Leviticus. There is more there than you think, and even the troubling parts are worth thinking about if you have a submissive attitude. But it’s still hard going.

So what I have been doing is going to the Study Bible online and clicking on Leviticus and then clicking on “Listen.” I use “command +” (on a Mac) to make the font bigger. Then I sit back and follow the words on the screen while he reads to me.

The reader is David Cochran Heath, and for my taste he is ver…

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Some good advice for the aging over at Jay Adams’ blog. He reflects on turning eighty.

Prepare for old age. True, you may never make it; there are former students of mine who have died already. If you don’t have some activity that you can engage in for the Lord, you will probably end up a sour and regretful old person.

This is the opportunity of a lifetime. I mean that. Don Carson, one of the most respected, faithful, competent, compelling, and understandable biblical scholars in the world will do what he has never done before and will probably never do again.

At the north campus of Bethlehem Baptist Church, over the next two weekends, starting at 6:30 P. M. Friday, February 20, Dr. Carson will lead a free 12 hour seminar that takes you through the whole Bible and puts the whole great story together.

If you are in or near the Twin Cities I encourage you to come. I promise you, you will never read the Bible the same after seeing how it all fits together with Dr. Carson’s help.

Ask your non-Chr…

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Today, 280 years ago, Solomon Stoddard, Jonathan Edwards’ grandfather, died. He had been pastor of the church in Northampton, MA for 60 years.

Jonathan had been his assistant for two years. Now he was the sole pastor. From this position, and later from Stockbridge, CT would emerge the greatest writing from any pastor America has ever produced.

The Jonathan Edwards Center at Yale University has fulfilled a dream I did not expect to see. With the 26 volumes of the Yale paper edition of the Works of Edwards selling for over $100 each, I never expected to see every word of Edwards freely available to read, search, and quote on line.

But there it is, like an ocean of hidden treasures …

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Jason French has created a beautiful celebration of God’s gift of life. He wrote the song and put together the video. It’s called “I’m Holding A Miracle.” We will show it as part of our sanctity of life focus this Sunday. I commend it to you for your joy.

At Bethlehem we close prayer week with a focus on the value of reading and memorizing Scripture in the new year.

Justin Taylor has pulled together a list of possible ways to read the Bible in this new year.

I encourage all of us to take the first day of the year and plan how we are going to read the Bible. Don’t leave it to chance.

Update : I am going with the Discipleship Journal Plan for one main reason. Few things discourage us more from reading the Bible through in a year than falling behind. This plan gives five catch up days every month. This is absolutely golden! I just printed it out at 9 AM New Year’s Day.

…is my big brother, Jim. He has been since I was young. Being five years older than me, he was always the epitome of what it meant to be big.

But when he was in college (and I in Jr. High) he was dramatically converted. And he became the most significant model for me in my teens and 20’s of what it meant to be a disciple of Jesus. He really lived what he believed.

He still does. He and his amazing wife, Raquel, have been church planters among the urban poor of Minneapolis for the past 15 years. I know the work they do. It is hard. It doesn’t garner much attention.

A call to preach to and live out the gospel with those struggling with generational poverty, life-controlling addictions, a…

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Dripping sweat on the paperback's pages, I speed-walked and read for one hour and twenty minutes holding this book in my hand so that I could finish it before my routine was over. That was two weeks ago. Since then I have been trying to figure out how to describe the way it has affected me. It’s mainly because of the Dad, Jeremiah Land.

I am talking about Leif Enger’s first novel, Peace Like a River. Abraham said I should read it. If my sons tell me to read a thing, I do—at least so far.

I fear saying something trite. I read one reviewer who said, “heartwarming.” Like a rifle bullet in the head, it’s heartwarming. The heart needs something bigger and deeper than warming. And this bo…

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