This week, the blog is sponsored by The Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals, which invites you to discover the Christ-centered, Spirit-filled preaching of the Reverend Eric Alexander.

Listen to Christ-centered, spirit-filled preaching from the Reverend Eric Alexander. Subscribe to the Hear the Word of God podcast, part of the Alliance Podcast Network.

For more than 50 years, Eric Alexander faithfully served as an ordained minister in the Church of Scotland, including many years as senior pastor of the historic St. George’s-Tron Church in the heart of Glasgow. His ministry extended far beyond Scotland, as he became a beloved speaker at the Philadelphia Conference on Reformed Theology, the Keswick Convention, and the Urbana Conference of InterVarsity Fellowship.

Widely regarded as one of the finest Bible expositors of the late 20th century, Eric Alexander’s influence continues to shape generations of pastors and teachers. Leaders such as Sinclair Ferguson, Ian Hamilton, and Alistair Begg have all benefited from his faithful, Christ-centered ministry.

As Ian Hamilton reflects:
“Eric’s ministry was an overflow of his life, an extension of who he was. For me, he epitomised everything that a gospel preacher should be.”

Rev. Alexander’s preaching is marked by clarity, depth, and a profound reverence for Scripture. With a masterful command of language, he unfolds God’s Word with precision and warmth—engaging the mind, stirring the heart, and calling listeners to worship, serve, and love the Triune God more deeply. His sermons do not merely inform; they transform, applying biblical truth to every area of life for the glory of God.

Now, you can hear this timeless preaching for yourself.

Subscribe today to Hear the Word of God, part of the Alliance Podcast Network, and be enriched by the faithful exposition of Scripture from one of the church’s most trusted voices. Available at AllianceNet.org or wherever you get your podcasts.

As we were raising our children, I always felt a bit of tension when it came to their future within the local church. I wanted my children to see their need for the church and to embrace its centrality in their lives. I wanted them to value and prioritize it as an essential part of valuing and prioritizing Christ. As they grew older and began to become independent, I longed for them to put their faith in Jesus and make full participation within his church an essential part of their lives. But I didn’t want to nag or cajole them. I wanted them to do this freely and joyfully and to do it as an outworking of their own convictions rather than a means of mollifying mom and dad.

I’m thankful that our children always enjoyed church and never fought against it. I’m more thankful still that each of them came to Christ when they were young teenagers, then pursued baptism and church membership. As soon as they moved away to attend college, they switched their membership to a local church in Louisville. Interestingly, each of them opted to join a different church, but joyfully, all three chose one that faithfully preaches the gospel. 

I recently tried to think back to consider some of the principles we found helpful as we raised children who actually wanted to go to church. Because I am a relentless and unashamed gleaner of the wisdom of others, these were all principles we observed or solicited from other families, then applied to our own. I hope you’ll find them helpful as we did.

Make church a part of your family culture. Every family develops a culture of its own—a collection of habits, patterns, and activities that come to define its unique identity. These can range from vacations (e.g., two weeks at the same holiday spot every summer) to movie nights (e.g., every Saturday night we watch a movie together) to food (e.g., Friday is pizza night). As a family culture develops, parents are wise to make church attendance a part of that culture. It doesn’t need to be explained or defended—this is what you do because this is who you are. It doesn’t need to be considered or debated, because when Sunday comes, you simply go to church. It is a non-negotiable part of your family culture.

Value church enough that it disrupts routine. Some of the hardest times to maintain consistency in church attendance are when children are small and when they depend on an established routine of meals and naps. It can be difficult for parents to disrupt this routine, especially when it means they may pay the price of a cranky infant or grumpy toddler. Many of us have witnessed families drift and even disappear at this stage of life. Yet a good routine should only ever be a faithful servant rather than a demanding master. You may simply need to resign yourself to having a cranky child on Sunday afternoons and a rough start to your week on Monday mornings. But some things, like church, are important enough that they should supersede routine.

Prioritize church over sports, lessons, and activities. Aileen and I have often expressed our gratitude that none of our children were outstandingly athletically gifted. They all enjoyed recreational sports or activities like baseball, soccer, and ballet, but none had skill or interest in advancing through rep or travel leagues. This meant that we never had to count the cost of travel ball, Sunday rehearsals, and other conflicts with church. But even if they had the skill and desire, we had already decided that we would not prioritize sports and activities over the church. I would not wish to be legalistic here and would leave each family to decide how to handle this matter, but as we look back, we think it was important to our family to know that church takes pride of place ahead of sports and activities. If many of us have seen families struggle with fitting church into routine, most likely all of us have seen families downplay church in favor of sports.

Attempt to prioritize church over jobs. While sports and activities are optional for young children, jobs are often a necessity for young adults. All of our children worked at a local grocery store, and they were mostly able to avoid working on Sundays, either by asking to be left off the calendar or by surrendering Sunday shifts to colleagues who were eager for more hours. Sometimes, though, especially before they had seniority, they were faced with the stark choice of working on a Sunday or resigning. In those cases, we decided together that, though Sunday work was not our preference, it may be an acceptable short-term measure until they had gained seniority. For all three, they soon proved themselves to their managers and only missed church on the rarest of occasions. Had their work demanded they work every Sunday, they would have resigned and looked for other jobs. To the best of our ability, we prioritized church over work.

Bring them into the service. I believe there is a place for nursery programs or other activities for younger children that run parallel to the Sunday worship services. In other words, I am not an advocate of Family Integrated Church. The particulars of such programming may vary a great deal based on context and culture, but I see no solid biblical argument that the whole family must be together for the whole service. That said, I think it can be of great practical benefit for the family to generally remain together once children are old enough to sit quietly—or relatively quietly, at least. By first grade, children are expected to know how to sit for extended periods, so that seems like it may be a natural time to wind down childcare so children can remain with their families. We found it a blessing to worship together as a family and to have the children witness our commitment to worship, preaching, the Lord’s Supper, baptism, and so on. When they were young, they often found it boring and had trouble sitting through, but we believe there was a lot of benefit in having them be present to see Christians worship.

Be committed to one church, but visit others. Looking back, Aileen and I are thankful that we were members of just one church through almost the entirety of our children’s childhood. This offered them stability and surrounded them with adults they knew, loved, and trusted—adults who valued church as much as their parents did. However, we are also thankful that we visited many other churches, sometimes while on vacation or visiting family, or sometimes just to have different experiences of worship. We think it was helpful to broaden our children’s view of church so they could see that all kinds of people are Christians and all kinds of people believe in the same prioritization of the local church.

Of course, all of this was supplemented by formally teaching them what the Bible says about coming to Christ in repentance and faith and then joining themselves to the local church. Yet because so much of what children learn is “caught” rather than “taught,” we wanted to raise them in such a way that they saw us put these principles into practice and live them out in our family life. By God’s grace, through these means and others, the Lord blessed them with a love for him and a love for his church.

In my weekly Works & Wonders article, I combine a brief devotional with other interesting and uplifting bits and pieces I gleaned throughout the week. These can be stories, poems, songs, articles, quotes, and just about anything else I found especially enjoyable in the week. I hope you enjoy this week’s collection! It includes:

1. The More You Have, the More You Want
2. God Showed Me My True Identity
3. Secrets of the Bees
4. A Haven in the Kitchen
5. Darkness Is My Closest Friend
6. Jackie and Shadow
7. The Far Side of the Moon

1.

Devotional: The More You Have, The More You Want

The renowned missionary David Brainerd once described a fascinating spiritual realization: “When I really enjoy God, I feel my desires of Him the more insatiable and my thirstings after holiness more unquenchable.” He had discovered that delight causes a kind of cascade effect where the more he had, the more he craved. Though his enjoyment of God satisfied him in one sense, it left him with an even deeper longing in another. John Piper makes a similar observation, going so far as to label our joy in God as a good and noble kind of greed. “Our joy in God is insatiably greedy,” he says. “The more you have, the more you want. The more you see, the more you want to see. The more you feel, the more you want to feel.” Like any other form of greed, it cannot be sated, but always longs for more. And this is just as God intended it, so that the closer we draw to him, the closer we long to be, and the more joy we find in him, the more joy we long to experience. We never fully arrive on this side of heaven and are never fully satisfied, but always long for the fullness of joy that will be ours when we are finally face-to-face with the one we love.

2.

God Showed Me My True Identity

Christianity Today has been sharing testimonies, and recently included Kyla Gillespie’s. Kyla was born female, but spent six years living as a man. It was the love and kindness of Christians that eventually caused her to turn to the Lord and then return to living as a woman. Her story is both tragic and encouraging.

I started drowning my stresses in alcohol when I was 19. Blackouts, partying, gambling, and a trail of failed same-sex relationships followed. Before long, my faith was nearly nonexistent. I chose the life I thought I wanted above my relationship with God. But when alcohol fueled a dangerous downward spiral, I chose to enter a Christian recovery center.

I got sober there, but my battles with same-sex attraction and gender dysphoria continued. To try to win the war raging inside of me, I decided to transition from female to male. Two years later, after hormone therapy, surgeries, and sweeping lifestyle changes, I could finally pass unnoticed in the world as a man.

I changed my name from Kyla to Brycen. I had arrived. With each step of the process, I eagerly awaited the satisfaction and relief that would surely follow. But they never came. Altering my body hadn’t healed the brokenness inside.

Read: Born a Woman, I Spent Six Years Living as a Man. Then God Showed Me My True Identity. (Gift link) Also consider reading her new book TransFormed, which gives her story in much more detail. I reviewed it here.

3.

Secrets of the Bees

I stumbled across the two-part National Geographic series Secrets of the Bees and really enjoyed it. The videography is first-rate and allows the viewer to see and enjoy bees as never before. The filmmaker simply wants to celebrate these little creatures, show them off in all their beauty and endless activity, help us understand their ingenuity, and realize how integral they are to the world around us. It’s on Disney+ in Canada, but it may be available elsewhere in different countries.

Here’s the trailer just to give you a peek:

(Can’t see it? Click here.)

4.

A Haven in the Kitchen

The New York Times recently covered a neat story about people with autism finding their place in restaurant kitchens. It tells of “a new program, Chefs on the Spectrum, meant to train and place people with autism in fine-dining jobs.” This program and others have found that autistic adults sometimes have special talents that make them ideal kitchen workers.

That talent can take several forms. Some cooks on the spectrum are meticulously organized at their stations. Some have an exceptional recall of recipes, and others are especially diligent about safety protocols …

Some students in TACT’s culinary program perform with astonishing consistency. If a restaurant wants meat butchered into a certain cut, Mr. Fierro said, “they’re going to make them exactly the same way every single time.”

A common hallmark of autism is a cultivation of special interests, intense and passionate devotions to particular topics. For cooks on the spectrum, this can mean a penchant for intellectual spelunking into, say, the molecular structure of hydrocolloids, or the behavior of the molds that produce blue cheese and miso.

Read: For People With Autism, Can Restaurant Kitchens Be a Haven? (Gift link)

5.

Psalm 88 (Darkness Is My Closest Friend)

Greg LaFollette recently released a powerful, melodic, and haunting version of Psalm 88.

(Can’t see it? Click here.)

6.

Jackie and Shadow

Jackie and Shadow are probably the world’s most famous bald eagles. They nest near Big Bear Lake in the San Bernardino National Forest in California and are constantly on camera. You can watch them right here or read the latest in the Eagle Log. As of the time I am writing, they have a pair of tiny chicks they are caring for. If you have a spare screen nearby, it’s kind of nice to just leave the video playing so you can check in on them from time to time. Just be sure to check your volume because, for all their virtues, bald eagles do not have a beautiful cry!

7.

The Far Side of the Moon

It was fun to track Artemis II as it pushed the frontiers of human accomplishment by taking human beings farther from Earth than ever before. Not surprisingly, social media was flooded with AI-generated junk claiming to be real. Thankfully, NASA released a definitive collection of the best genuine images on NASA’s Artemis II Lunar Flyby page. The photos, which are free to download, give us new reasons to marvel at the wonders of God in his creation.

This week, the blog and this giveaway are sponsored by Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals.

Matthew Henry’s Method for Prayer, now available in carefully abridged ebook editions from the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals, invites modern believers into a deeper, more meaningful communion with God. In an age defined by constant noise, distraction, and spiritual fatigue, the timeless wisdom of Matthew Henry speaks with renewed clarity.

Henry’s work was crafted in a world far removed from smartphones, social media, and the relentless pace of modern life. And yet, man’s spiritual needs have remained the same. Henry’s words concerning prayer, then, are as relevant now as they have ever been.

Method for Prayer is more than a devotional—it is a structured, Scripture-rich guide designed to help believers pray with greater depth, confidence, and intentionality. Drawing extensively from the Bible, Henry organizes prayer into thoughtful categories, equipping readers with language and themes that align their hearts with God’s will. Whether you are new to prayer or seeking to enrich your lifelong practice, this work offers a pathway to more focused, spiritually grounded communication with the Lord.

Featuring ESV, KJV, NIV, and NASB versions, the Method for Prayer ebooks are available now through Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and other major ebook retailers. Readers are also invited to enter a special giveaway for a chance to win one of four free copies in their preferred translation. Don’t miss this opportunity—the drawing ends April 30.

Every year, as winter turns to spring, I begin to look to our garden. On the first day when the sun shines with warmth, and the temperature rises at least a few degrees above freezing, I go outside and look for them—the little yellow flowers that are always the first to bloom. The crocuses and daffodils show up in April, the tulips in May, and the irises in June. But these are March flowers or, in an especially warm year, even February.

They must be hardy little things, for they bloom at a time of year when the temperature lurches and swings like a drunk—warm and bright one day, but gray and cold the next. There are often still stretches of snow at this time, so they sometimes get buried beneath the drifts. Yet when the sun returns and the snow melts, there they are, still yellow and bright, and still bringing their little bit of cheer. In their own way, they portend the end of winter and the coming of spring. They are a little deposit, a little down payment, a little bit of assurance of better days to come.

There are many impressive plants in this world and many splendid creatures. There are views, scenes, and landscapes that are almost too beautiful to behold. But few things move me more deeply than a Christian who holds joyfully steadfast under severe trial. Few things are more supernatural than a person who knows the Lord’s providence has directed a great loss, yet who continues to love and serve him all the more. True faith is especially vivid and beautiful when it takes the form of unshakable joy.

My travels have introduced me to a great many people who have suffered the loss of a child, a great many who have lost a spouse, and a great many who grapple with physical trials that rarely ebb and never completely heal. What a blessing it is when they acknowledge their pain but also acknowledge God’s goodness, when they prove they are sorrowful yet rejoicing, when they go on trusting in the God who makes no mistakes. Though they are in agony of body or spirit, still they praise the Lord and proclaim his glories. Though they are broken, they rejoice; though they are heartbroken, they worship; though they have been brought low, they lift their voices high.

Such people are like the little yellow flowers that adorn my garden even when the calendar still says “winter.” Just as the least warmth causes those flowers to push their way into the sunlight to spread their cheer, the least evidence of God’s goodness causes these people to rejoice. Just as these flowers live on beneath the banks of snow, the joy of these people lives on beneath the trials and struggles. Just as these flowers foreshadow the coming of spring, the faith of these people foreshadows the coming of that time when every sorrow will be swept away, when faith will give way to sight, and when joy will reign forever. Their joy is nothing less than heaven’s own joy, blooming ahead of its time, and assuring us that before long, the cold of winter will give way to an endless summer.

Here is something I have often wondered as I ponder modern entertainment and entertainers: Why does so much of it involve mocking and belittling the Christian faith? Why is there such a desire to violate and trample upon Christian ethics and morality? Why would the opening ceremonies of the Olympics feature a lurid, transgender version of the Last Supper designed specifically to be contemptuous and offensive? Why would so many people advocate that mere children be exposed to drag queen story hours? Why has abortion advanced from a rare but unfortunate option to an event to be celebrated and boasted of? Carl Trueman offers a compelling answer in his new book, The Desecration of Man: How the Rejection of God Degrades Our Humanity.

If over the past few years you have done much reading in thoughtful Christian books, you have probably come across the term “disenchantment.” This is the idea that the world no longer regards anyone or anything as transcendent, which in turn means that any meaning or significance we may find must exist within the natural world. And while it is certainly true that the modern Western world has become disenchanted, Trueman finds this an inadequate explanation of our times, for the “idea that man is disenchanted does not explain some of the most notable features of our current cultural climate. As Tara Isabella Burton has reported, our age is not marked by the disappearance of belief in the supernatural, the weird and the wonderful. In fact, there is an efflorescence of new religions. Religious belief has not disappeared; we simply have more religions to choose from—indeed, we can even invent our own today.”

But what of the old religion of Christianity and its values that were once normative and considered of cultural benefit? “Our world is not characterized by a disillusioned indifference to values once grounded in religious faith. Rather, it often seems to revel in an ecstatic destruction of all that was once considered sacred.” Society “glories in transgression, and transgression is exhilarating.” This is exactly what we see on the big screen, the little screen, and the iPhone screen.

Especially among cultural elites, “Transgression of that once considered sacred has become their primary task. And transgression of the sacred is exhilarating precisely because it makes us feel like gods, the creators of our own meanings and our own selves. All we need to do is cross lines previously enforced by the idea of God and we thereby assume the role of being gods.” It is by transgressing the restrictions of Christian morality that people experience the exhilaration of freedom that makes them feel like gods. In other words, desecration is all the rage. It is not enough to simply decline to be Christian or to disagree with Christian morality. No, to be an authentic and respectable human is to delight in transgressing God’s rules. Yet, as usual, man takes the bait without seeing the hook: “The modern notion of man—free and autonomous as demonstrated by his ability to transgress boundaries once considered sacred—has paradoxically reduced him to nothing. In desecrating God, he has ironically desecrated himself.” Ironically, as man attempts to make himself like God, he behaves like a beast. In his attempt to elevate himself, he actually diminishes and desecrates himself.

Having laid out his thesis, Trueman first asks and answers a question that should be straightforward: What is man? Yet the answer of the past (a being created in God’s image and given great purpose, worth, and dignity) has been overthrown so that man is now a being who has evolved from no one and nothing and is therefore autonomous. Man defines himself today by his ability and program of desecration, which involves transgressing whatever rules, limits, or strictures God demands of him.

Trueman then looks to Nietzsche and his famous declaration that man has killed God. Having killed God, man must become god and create his own meaning and his own truth. Though Nietzsche described this state long ago, it has taken a century for its consequences to seep into culture to such a degree that it is now an aspect of our “cultural imaginary.” But this is the world we live in today—a world in which each man is a self-creator who is responsible for functioning as his own god, determining his own beliefs, his own purpose, and his own notions of good and evil.

Several technological innovations of the modern world are deeply entwined with this self-creation by giving us godlike powers. They manifest themselves most notably in sex, reproduction, and death. Each of these receives a chapter-length treatment that shows vividly how they further man’s desecration. Pornography has reduced human beings to objects rather than people; IVF (though often well-intentioned) has turned babies into commodities while fueling a new wave of eugenics; euthanasia has given us the power over the time and manner of our own death and, increasingly, the death of other people.

In the face of such destruction, even many who are antagonistic toward the Christian faith are realizing that they do not wish to live in a world completely devoid of Christianity’s influence. Hence, atheists like Richard Dawkins wish to preserve a kind of cultural Christianity, even if not a devotional or dogmatic one. Yet Trueman understands, rightly, that desecration demands a much more substantial response than cultural Christianity or even mere re-enchantment: It demands consecration—a full commitment to the creed, cult, and code of the Christian faith, which is to say, the beliefs, practice, and morality of historic Christianity, as found within the local church. And this, ultimately, is the hope, the message, and the call of his book:

If desecration is the pervasive problem of our day, then nothing less than consecration is the answer. We have imagined ourselves to be gods and have ironically reduced ourselves to mere dust. That is a moral problem. It cannot be solved simply by “reenchanting” our world by acknowledging that nature is mysterious or that there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamed of in our consumerist philosophies of life. Consecration is not a feeling or an emotional response to something; it has a distinct dogmatic, cultic, and moral shape, with all three elements standing in nonnegotiable connection to each other. … Only a renovation of the heart, redirecting it toward God, is able to [answer our plight]. And that only takes place in the context of the church, where humanity by creed, cult, and code can once again realize what being made in the image of God truly means.

The Desecration of Man is a challenging and sobering read, yet a helpful one, for it helps explain the world as it is today. Better still, it is an optimistic one, for it calls us to commit and re-commit ourselves to the divine solution, which is understanding, practicing, and living out the Christian faith in the context of the local church. The Desecration of Man complements The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self and Strange New World (both of which are on sale in their Kindle editions this week), as together they help Christians understand this world and live well within it.

There are many difficult vocations in the world and many that require a host of useful skills. But I’m convinced that few jobs require a broader skillset than the pastor, and especially the pastor of the average church—the church of modest size that cannot simply hire a new staff member to take on every task the senior pastor does not wish to do or that he does poorly. A young man who intends to pastor in Canada, and who therefore acknowledges that he may well be the sole pastor on staff at a local church, recently asked me, Do extroverts make better pastors? Behind the question was this uncertainty: Can I, as an introvert, be a successful solo pastor? This is my attempt to answer the question.

We should acknowledge that introvert and extrovert are neither Bible words nor even biblical concepts, and that there is no Greek or Hebrew equivalent to either one. Neither Moses, nor Paul, nor anyone who came between them thought in those terms. Then again, neither used a direct equivalent to Trinity or penal substitutionary atonement, so a term need not appear in the Bible to be helpful or to describe reality.

We should always be aware, though, where our terms come from. In this case, they come from the teachings of Carl Jung, a man who was a great despiser of the Christian faith. In that way they are tainted and, if used at all, should not be used in every way he may have used them. Yet if we look to their etymological roots, we can see that there is something to them. Introvert means turned in and extrovert means turned out, so that an introvert is one who tends to internalize his thoughts and process them inwardly, while an extrovert is one who tends to externalize his thoughts and process them outwardly. An introvert is one who tends to feel refreshed and energized by being alone, while an extrovert is one who tends to feel refreshed and energized by being with people. If we take them no further than this, we can acknowledge them as helpful descriptors of two broad personality types: the quieter and the outgoing. Of course, we also need to acknowledge that each is a spectrum, so that some are more introverted or extroverted than others, and that some are perfectly balanced between the two.

Now back to our question: Do extroverts make better pastors?

My answer is no. Both can be equally faithful and fruitful in ministry, though both can be tempted to use personality as an excuse for faithlessness. Neither should think their personality is intrinsically sinful, inferior, or deficient, and neither should try to change themselves into something they are not. Peter would make a poor John, and John would make a poor Peter. Both introverted and extroverted pastors will have different strengths to celebrate and different weaknesses to work on.¹

For example, a pastor who is introverted may find it easier to be alone with his thoughts when diligently studying Scripture and meditating upon it. He may find it easier to dedicate long periods of time to the solitude that allows him to pray or simply ponder deep matters. He may speak little, but pack more wisdom into his few words.

A pastor who is extroverted may find it easier to carry out the social functions of the ministry—counseling parishioners, joining in meetings, and greeting people as they file out of church. He may find it easier to be a discipler and mentor, surrounding himself with people he means to teach and train. He may look forward to being in the pulpit and find that after he preaches he is more energized than before he began.

Yet he will also have his areas of weakness and will need to ask God to help him with these. He may find solitude difficult and find it hard to be alone with the Lord to pray. He may be too dependent upon the presence of other people or look down on those who are less extroverted than he is, thinking that quietness is necessarily a liability in ministry. Meanwhile, the introvert may find himself shying away from the social functions of ministry or find it challenging to be the one who faithfully “entrusts these things to faithful men” (2 Timothy 2:2). He may be jealous of the gregarious pastor and believe that, by comparison, he has some great deficiency.

Yet God is a master at making the best use of our personalities. This shouldn’t surprise us, since he is the one who created us, who carefully crafted us so that we are different from one another. I am convinced he receives more glory from using a multitude of personality types than just one, and so he delights to use the slow-moving and contemplative and the impetuous and impulsive alike. He uses the Moseses and the Aarons, the Ruths and the Naomis, the Marys and the Marthas. He uses them to the degree that they are dutiful, turning their quietness or verbosity, their inwardness or outwardness, their taciturnity or loquaciousness into love for him and service to his people.

Hence, the introvert must be a dutiful introvert, one who acknowledges and accepts what is true about himself but also determines he will never let it interfere with his duty before the Lord. He will not pretend he is an extrovert or stop valuing times of solitude, but he will also not allow his personality to excuse any failure to fulfill the opportunities God presents to him. The extrovert must likewise be a dutiful extrovert, one who acknowledges and accepts what is true about himself but also determines he will never let it interfere with his duty before the Lord. He will not pretend he is an introvert or stop valuing times when he is surrounded by people, but he will also not allow his personality to excuse any failure to pursue the quiet disciplines God expects of him.

Neither of the two broad personality types is better than the other, and neither comes with a greater likelihood of success or failure. While God works through our personalities, he also works apart from our personalities when we humbly submit them to him. He does not make the inward man outgoing or the outgoing man inward, but rather amplifies his desires, his obedience, and his abilities. He gives him a willingness to work apart from his personality when this is what it would mean to serve.

Is it the introverted man that God prefers to be a pastor or the extroverted one? Neither and both! It is the broken and contrite man that God delights to use, the dutiful and surrendered one. This is the man whom God delights to use to shepherd his sheep.

1. Speaking of different personality types, I’ve often gotten a chuckle out of this quote from De Witt Talmage: “Jonathan Edwards preached Christ in the severest argument ever penned. John Bunyan preached Christ in the sublimest allegory ever composed. … It might have been a very different story if Jonathan Edwards had tried to write and dream about a pilgrim’s progress to the celestial city, or John Bunyan had attempted an ‘Essay on the Human Will.'” ↩︎

In my weekly Works & Wonders article, I combine a brief devotional with other interesting and uplifting bits and pieces I gleaned throughout the week. These can be stories, poems, songs, articles, quotes, and just about anything else I found especially enjoyable in the week that was or that I am especially looking forward to in the week to come.

Today:

1. A Lord’s Day Devotional
2. 10 Great Innovations That Were Discovered By Mistake
3. Symmetry
4. A Model of NYC
5. Wild About Beetles
6. “Christ For Every Nation”
7. Dying Men No More To Die

1.

Devotional: The Shoreline of Wonder

If you wished to search for driftwood or seashells or sea glass, you would do well to visit the coast at the point where the beaches are longest, for the longer the shoreline, the greater the likelihood of finding what you seek. And in Ralph Sockman’s metaphor, the likelihood of finding delight in God is directly proportional to our knowledge of God: “The larger the island of knowledge, the longer the shoreline of wonder.” If we know little about God, there is little to spark awe within us. But if we know much about God, we will inevitably find much that causes us to marvel at who he is. This puts on each of us the responsibility to know God as he is, to study what he has revealed of himself through nature—where “the heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork” (Psalm 19:1) —and what he has revealed of himself through the Bible—where we learn that “the precepts of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart” (Psalm 19:8). To know God is to delight in God, and to know God more is to delight in God more, for the scope of our wonder depends upon the span of our knowledge.

2.

10 Great Innovations That Were Discovered By Mistake

How ingenious are human beings? Ingenious enough that sometimes they discover great things by mistake—or when trying to solve other problems. This article in the Wall Street Journal highlights 10 American inventions that all came about by mistake. It includes some you probably already know about, like Post-it Notes and Cornflakes, but others that you may not have guessed, like Scotchguard and Saccharin.

3.

Symmetry

I have always been drawn to symmetry in photography. To get this symmetrical shot, I had to lie on the floor in a hotel lobby in Recife, Brazil, and wait for the elevators to roughly align. I probably looked a bit crazy, but I think it was worth it.

4.

A Model of NYC

I saw a number of stories this week about a new exhibit at the Museum of the City of New York. Joe Macken, a truck driver, spent 20 years building a detailed miniature model of New York City. He used the simplest of materials: balsa wood, cardboard, Elmer’s glue, and an X-Acto knife. But with only this, he created a remarkable piece of folk art. His daughter convinced him to begin sharing scenes from it on social media, and it took off from there. Most of us can’t get to the Museum of the City of New York, but we can at least enjoy the photographs of it at sites like Artnet: A Truck Driver Spent 20 Years Building a Miniature Model of New York City. Then, It Went Viral.

5.

Wild about Beetles

It is good to enjoy God’s creation, and perhaps especially those creatures that we are prone to overlook. In this case, Margaret Helder celebrates the humble beetle, which God created in huge numbers (upwards of 20,000 species) and with an incredible variety in shape, form, and function.

Ladybugs and indeed all beetles, are wonderful examples of the richness and variety we see in nature. Beetles are quite plain in their basic organization. The amazing diversity in appearance as well as in lifestyle, tells us something about the Creator. God loves variety and He loves beauty! The fancy elaborations on the beetle theme in terms of talents and appearance, can only serve to increase our interest in the creation. Could the various ecosystems survive with plainer looking beetles? No doubt. But isn’t it fun to be able to observe and enjoy beetles in all their vast variety?

6.

Christ To Every Nation

I have really been enjoying the band Stillcreek. This new song, which they co-wrote with Trevin Wax, is another great addition to their collection. You can read Trevin’s explanation of the song at his blog. Here’s the opening verse:

O how beautiful the feet
of the ones who bring good news
that the Son of God has come
full of grace and truth.

At the cross, He bore our sin
then He overcame the grave.
Now His resurrection life
reaches far to save.

(Can’t see it? Click here)

7.

Dying Men No More To Die

Christians have a complicated relationship with death. While we deplore death’s existence and long for its demise, we also know that death is the only way, apart from Christ’s return, that we will be relieved from all the troubles and sorrows of this world. De Witt Talmage captures some of that positive aspect of death in this excerpt from one of his sermons:

I saw a beautiful being wandering up and down the earth. She touched the aged, and they became young. She touched the poor, and they became rich. I said, “Who is this beautiful being, wandering up and down the earth?” They told me that her name was Death. What a strange thrill of joy when the palsied Christian begins to use his arm again! When the blind Christian begins to see again! When the deaf Christian begins to hear again! When the poor pilgrim puts his feet on such pavement, and joins in such company, and has a free seat in such a great temple! Hungry men no more to hunger; thirsty men no more to thirst; weeping men no more to weep; dying men no more to die.

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I do not know Carl Trueman all that well, but from what I do know of him, he is not a man who is prone to overexcitement or hyperbole. Because of that, when he does get excited about something, I am likely to pay attention. It is for that reason that I found myself intrigued by a book he recommended as “remarkable” and “that rarest of books.” He says if you read it, “you will be informed, entertained, and edified.” That was enough for me, so I did as he suggested: “Take up and read.”

 30 Key Moments in the History of Christianity by Mark W. Graham is a history of the early church—the church of the first millennium. Graham begins at the end of the Apostolic era and closes 900 years later, just around 1000 AD. He tells this history by focusing on 30 specific moments that proved especially significant. Such an approach has both limitations and benefits. In terms of limitations, “readers might well find themselves wishing for the larger historical picture and searching to fill in the gaps between and among the moments covered here.” Of course, people may also want greater depth or wish to hear about characters or events the author chose not to include. Yet Graham addresses and mitigates this limitation by providing thorough citations and a list of recommended works that will provide what his work lacks.

This approach has benefits, too. It allows the author to focus on only the key events and people, thus passing over ones that may matter, but may not be quite as interesting or important. It also allows him to keep the book’s size manageable and reader-friendly at 235 pages. It also makes it the kind of book that can be read casually, since the chapters are relatively brief and, though they follow one another chronologically, they do not necessarily follow one another thematically, so each can be read independently.

The joy of 30 Key Moments in the History of Christianity is that it introduces a period of history most Christians know little about. Even Reformed Christians, who tend to put a premium on knowledge of church history, still often skip quickly from the Apostles to the Councils to the Reformation (probably also pausing to cover Huss and Wycliffe). Yet, as Graham so aptly points out, there are many of “Our People” (the endearing term he uses throughout) in the first millennium whose stories we ought to know. And to our surprise, we will find they existed “on the shores of the Black Sea, the Red Sea, [and] the Mediterranean Sea, [and] deep in the Middle East, Britain [and] China.” 

Graham does more than introduce them and tell their stories—he also draws lessons that are applicable to Christians today. So, for example, when he discusses Donatism, he draws this application:

Such might call to mind the all-too-common anonymous online attacks and deep-faked videos we see today by zealous Christians who imagine their cause as just and desire quick victories, even at the expense of openness and truth. Wisdom can never be in such corners, regardless of how justified some might feel in carrying out dishonest and cowardly acts.

He continues:

Christians sometimes revel in nostalgia. It is not uncommon to hear Christians today pining for a return to the fourth-century church or to sixteenth-century communities, or even imagining themselves as the restoration of the first-century church. Quite often, a bit of historical scrutiny reveals a fundamental myth of a golden age that never really existed.

Here is another example related to the Byzantine Empire and the first Holy War:

Assuming that our victories are ultimately God’s victories carries a serious risk. Despite Christian confidence over the centuries that each moment is the culminating moment in history, so often it has been revealed to be what it is—a mere episode in the history of Our People. History holds important lessons for us that are painful at times but always helpful. Where does the Russia-Ukraine conflict fit into God’s timetable of history? In ten years, will the conflict between Hezbollah and Israel still be seen as a signal of the imminent apocalypse? Confidently affirming that “we trust in the name of the Lord” (Ps. 20:7) does not commit God’s people to speculating on each moment in history and its place in God’s ultimate timetable for humanity.

This is history, but history we can learn from, history that applies to the present day. 

Having read 30 Key Moments in the History of Christianity, I understand and echo Trueman’s enthusiasm for it. Even if your reading diet does not regularly include history, I’d encourage you to change that with this book. I expect you’ll soon echo Trueman as well.