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The interconnectedness of everything: 30 Easter Eggs you will find in Pixar movies. Only goes to show what geniuses those folks are. (Hat tip: Wardrobe Door)
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Kids say the darnedest things especially in bookstores. Prepare to be heartwarmed. (Hat tip: Book Riot)
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Baseball's instant replay system was supposed help umpires get calls right. Except when it doesn't. My prediction is there are going to be a lot more stories about an overturned call being a deciding factor in a lot of games this season. That is not what Bud Selig wanted.
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When Platt wasn't enough. I really like this insight on why a church needs a flesh and blood pastor:
These days, Christians can slip into treating preaching like a consumer commodity and preachers like buffet selections. With the internet, a believer can choose a different style and a different preacher for every mood and preference.
However, my church realized they needed a pastor. A flesh and blood pastor is crucial for the local church because preaching is an act of spiritual warfare. A pastor is a shepherd who fights in the trenches next to his sheep, defending them from the wolves. You can’t simply phone that in! Only an in-person preacher can bear the burdens of the congregation, weep with those who weep, and rejoice with those who rejoice. That’s what we see clearly in Scripture. Preaching and teaching are normative functions of the shepherding pastor (1 Tim 3:2b, 5:17, 2 Tim 4:2, Titus 2:1).
That is to say,pastors care for the flock by preaching and teaching, rebuking those who contradict sound doctrine (Titus 1:9). Can a preacher disconnected from a local church—in fact, completely oblivious of it’s existence—defend that flock from false teaching? Can he fend off the wolves? Can he shepherd the flock, exercise oversight, or rule well?
A church ought to receive preaching from a man who knows the church’s struggles, their strengths, their needs, their victories—in short, knows them. True biblical preaching not only rightly interprets the Word, but it also lands and applies uniquely and specifically in the people who are sitting under that Word.Hat tip: Challies
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Follow the truth:
Given what is taking place in the world today, do we have any indications that to follow Christ will become more and more comfortable? The Bible Belt, long the cultural bastion of “biblical values,” has long been heading toward the spiritual ruins of post-Christendom. Cultural Christianity is wasting away. And the outside world is becoming more and more hostile to the things of faith. Even some professing Christians are becoming hostile to those who will not move according to the shifting winds of the culture. And if God is doing anything in ordaining these cultural shifts to come to pass, it may be this: We are finding out who the real Christians are. (Even today, some are announcing in anger and embarrassment that they will never again call themselves evangelical, to which we must respond with all sincerity and soberness, “Thank you.”)
Hat tip: Aaron Armstrong
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Class act: Ed Sheeran grants a dying teenage girl's request by serenading her during her last minutes of life.
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Searching for a mentor? Look no further than your bookshelf.
It has become apparent to me that many people, especially young Christians seeking maturity, desire for someone to come alongside them and mentor them. I myself have profited immensely from sitting underneath the godly influence of men of faith. I believe it is a noble and holy thing to seek out men and women of faith that may speak truth into your life. You can pursue these people through getting involved in community and service. As you meet seasoned saints, you can ask them to carve out time to meet with you. However, in a church context where we have significantly more young people desiring a “mentor” than we have people who have walked through a long life of faith in God, we must be aware that there will not always be men and women of this stature at our disposal.
We hope that a mentor will share their life with us, speak truth, lead us to pray and worship, share with us a greater knowledge of Scripture and offer insight into living a godly life. I believe that a great book can do some of these things. Your shelves can be overflowing with mentors.
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