Memorial Day weekend is the traditional welcome into summer. Long days, outside reading, baseball, iced tea, sunshine — 'tis the season of unparalleled displays of God's common benevolence.

And it's also full of exciting opportunities for us to grow in the grace of prayer.

God's grace is immeasurable, not seasonal (Ephesians 2:7). There's not more of him now than in January, but summer tends to open our eyes a little wider. We can see a little clearer. And this helps how we pray.

C. S. Lewis:

For what I call "myself" (for all practical, everyday purposes) is also a dramatic construction. . . Normally I call this construction "me," and the stage set "the real world." Now the mom…

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If you are a pregnant mom, perhaps with your first baby, you may be reading these articles about Mommy Wars and shaking your head. As if you didn’t have enough on your mind already!

In the chaos of battles over things like bottle feeding, co-sleeping, and baby wearing, Carolyn has pointed out how the real Mommy Wars are primarily spiritual battles. The real battles are not against other moms who have different mothering preferences, but against our adversary the devil who prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour (1 Peter 5:8).

God has provided protection for the pregnant woman against the schemes of the devil.

The armor of God comes in maternity sizes.

For the nex…

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John Piper, Desiring God (Multnomah, 2011), 10:

God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him.

(Design submitted by Jacob Abshire.)

You know the guy I'm talking about. He spends hours into the night playing video games and surfing for pornography. He fears he's a loser. And he has no idea just how much of a loser he is. For some time now, studies have shown us that porn and gaming can become compulsive and addicting. What we too often don't recognize, though, is why.

In a new book, The Demise of Guys: Why Boys Are Struggling and What We Can Do About It, psychologists Philip Zimbardo and Nikita Duncan say we may lose an entire generation of men to pornography and video gaming addictions. Their concern isn't about morality, but instead about the nature of these addictions in reshaping the patten of desires necessary for…

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As a part of American jargon, the “mommy wars” have raged for more than 20 years. The term was coined in the late 1980s by Child magazine to describe the tension that existed between working and stay-at-home mothers. Since then, numerous books and articles have been published about the so-called mommy wars, feeding the talk show circuit and fueling blogosphere brushfires.

But our history of cultural ambivalence about motherhood is much longer. Allow me a moment for a quick overview.

Shortly after our nation was founded, motherhood hit a high note. As historian Glenna Matthews writes in Just A Housewife, this new political experiment needed mothers:

There were no precedents for a r…

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Do you, like me, have family members who do not believe in Jesus? If so, we are in good company. So did Jesus. And I think this is meant to give us hope. 

According to the Apostle John, “not even his brothers believed in him” (John 7:5). That’s incredible. Those who had lived with Jesus for 30 years really did not know him. Not one of Jesus’ brothers is mentioned as a disciple during his pre-crucifixion ministry. But after his resurrection and ascension, there they are in the upper room worshiping him as God (Acts 1:14).

Why didn’t they believe? And what made them change?

The Bible doesn’t answer the first question. But I’ll bet it was difficult to have Jesus for a brother.

…

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Discipleship is about values. This could not be clearer in the Gospels. Jesus' call is for a double action: leave and follow. "Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men," he first said to Peter and Andrew in Matthew 4:19. And "Immediately they left their nets and followed him." Then to James and John. And "Immediately they left the boat and their father and followed him." Whether nets or family, the call to follow Jesus is the call to walk away from something else. It is the call to this, not that. Here, not there.

The disciples knew this. They knew they were forsaking one thing for another. And they knew pleasure was at the root. That's why Peter asked what he did in Matthew 19:2…

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This parable* was told to some mothers who engaged in Mommy Wars and trusted in themselves that they figured it all out, and treated others with contempt:

Two mothers woke up and opened their Bibles to pray, one a perfect mother and the other a not-so-perfect mother.

The perfect mother prayed thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am Mom enough, not like other mothers who have no clue what they’re doing, or even like those whose children disobey and don’t achieve as much as mine do.

But the not-so-perfect mother prayed, ‘God, help me, a grace-dependent mother whose faith is so small but whose God is so great!’

Christian and non-Christian mothers alike decry the issue of mother-to-mother …

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I find it easy to slip into vague gratefulness, and vague gratefulness is as hollow as a light bulb. Mostly I notice this at the dinner table with my family. The vague verbiage I speak over our food is a reflection of my vague thoughts about God and his provisions spread across the table. (It’s certainly not a reflection of my wife’s cooking!)

If you find this vaguity in your prayers, Douglas Wilson offers us a remedy in his new book Father Hunger. In a section on vocation, Wilson points us to look deeper into the gracious provisions from God:

We have to understand that all Christians are called, and are called to labor self-consciously and faithfully in their calling, whether it is l…

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John Piper writes about a conversation with his wife, Noël, when he was preaching a series on marriage a few years ago. After a couple sermons on the foundation and ultimate meaning of marriage he asked for her feedback. "You cannot say too often that marriage is a model of Christ and the church," she replied.

And she is positively right. Marriage as a picture of Jesus and the church is "Marriage 101" for most Christians and yet, we cannot underline the truth enough.

We've heard it helpfully said of the gospel that it's not just the thing that gets you into the Christian life, but also that which empowers your everyday Christian living. There's a parallel here in how we talk about marr…

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