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Christian Living
Twenty Benefits from the Lord’s Supper
Our Reformed and Puritan forebears were fond of calling the Lord’s Supper a feast. They viewed it as a feast given by the Lord of hosts, the faithful, covenant-keeping God, who, in Christ Jesus, is the author, founder, master, and divine host of this feast. He provides this feast “of...
Christian Living
Receive Criticism Realistically
Coping with criticism in the ministry requires a healthy reckoning with reality. Perhaps this strikes you as a strange point for us to make at the beginning of a section on practical principles for handling criticism. What does reality have to do with properly receiving verbal critique? There is an...
Christian Living
Preach Christ
A healthy church is one that is shaped by the gospel. Our people need to see the beauty of Christ. Nothing will enable them to lovingly and humbly give and receive constructive critique more than heart-searching, expository gospel preaching. This is our great task and privilege as ministers—to proclaim Christ....
Resources
The Lord’s Supper as a love feast
The church of all ages has regarded the Lord’s Supper as a love feast in two ways: first, we regard it vertically, through communion with God. When remembering Christ at His Supper, we may experience a love both from Christ and for Christ that can better be experienced than explained....
Christian Living
Prayer is amazing, glorious, delightful work.
Prayer is amazing, glorious, delightful work. Yet apart from faith in Christ, prayer is also difficult, demanding, and in many ways impossible. There is not a believer on earth that cannot sympathize with that. So, though I may have bordered on the idealistic in this closing chapter, my aim is...
Christian Living
Taking Hold of God in Prayer
Deep within us, we know that it is impossible to solve prayerlessness by our own strength. The sacredness, gift, and efficacy of prayer are far above human means. God’s grace is necessary for prayerful praying. Yet grace does not passively wait for God to strike us with revival. We must...
Church History
Puritans on Marital Love
Edward Taylor (c. 1642–1729), a pastor, physician, and poet of Puritan New England, wrote, “A curious knot God made in Paradise…. It was the true-love knot, more sweet than spice.” The writings of the Puritans are sprinkled with declarations of the sweetness of marital love. They delighted in the love...
Christian Living
Practical Benefits of Psalm Singing
Albert Bailey rightly concludes that Calvin’s theological beliefs about the Psalter helped unite the Reformers and Puritans around the conviction that “only God’s own Word was worthy to be used in praising Him.” Psalm singing was important to Calvin and the Puritans, however, not only because it is biblical and...
Resources
Keep the Lord’s Day in hopeful anticipation
If we keep the Sabbath with delight, then the Lord promises us that He “will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth, and feed thee with the heritage of Jacob thy father: for the mouth of the LORD hath spoken it.” To “ride upon the high...
