Life Together

Al Mohler and Russell Moore offer a compelling basis for celebrating and encouraging adoption in the local church.

(HT: JT)

My friend, Chad Nuss, puts the gospel into picture form with helpful notes and Scriptures at his blog, christoschurch.  Here’s a sampling:

The Sunday School Revolutionary offers the positives of taking prayer requests in Sunday School as well as some helpful suggestions to avoid taking too much time:

Positives

• Class members feel like someone cares for them
• Class leadership has the opportunity to serve through prayer
• Praying for each other builds community

Suggestions

• Take requests at the end of class
• Take written, not verbal, requests
• Send requests out by e-mail

What do you think?  Do you have any other suggestions?

My twin brother, Mark, and his family will return to Japan next week.  This is a picture of him speaking at my parents’ church in Iowa.  Please pray that God would continue to embolden Mark and Maki to share the love of Christ to the Japanese people.  If you’re interested in getting Mark’s email updates about his ministry in Japan, please let me know.  You can also visit his blog here.

Justin Beadles with some helpful thoughts on why it’s better to internalize rather than memorize your message (sermon, speech, etc.):

Unless you are a student competing in a division that requires such, there is no need to memorize your speech. You simply need to internalize it. This means you think through the flow and main idea enough that it becomes natural to recall. Memorizing and manuscripting are both unnecessary in my book. They take a colossal amount of time and, with rare exception, come off stilted and unfeeling.

Here is a tactic from the ancients that might help you internalize your next speech:

I think through all my speeches in terms of taking people on a tour of my house.

1. The Front Door: This is my introduction
2. The Living Room: My first point
3. The Dining Room: My second point
4. The Play Room: My conclusion

At any time I need only remember what room I am in and am then able to recall easily where the speech is headed. Try it and see.

My friend, Jonathan Dodson, writes a powerful article with practical suggestions on how the church can fight together against sin.  May more pastors follow his example.  Here’s an excerpt:

The phone rang. It was our worship leader. With trembling speech he said: “Hey man, it’s an emergency. I made a huge mistake.” Within minutes I was dealing with a broken worship leader, a moral failure, a threatened marriage and a leadership crisis.

Weeks later, we were still trying to come to a mutual understanding of what the restoration process would look like. One of the things we agreed upon was to start a Fight Club.  (read the rest here)

Hey, all you parents!  Check out this audio clip of C.J. and Carolyn Mahaney answering the following important questions:

How do parents transfer a love for the local church to their children? How does making the church family a priority shape the priorities of the immediate family? How does this priority affect a child’s involvement in sports and other activities?