Issue
Prayer
Vol. 27, No. 6 • Nov/Dec 2018
“When you say grace you can say it to grown-up Jesus or teenage Jesus or bearded Jesus or whoever you want.”—Will Ferrell, Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby No one watches a Will Ferrell movie for an accurate theology of prayer, but if they wanted a general idea of how many North Americans approach […]
All Articles (15)
Letter from the Editor
“When you say grace you can say it to grown-up Jesus or teenage Jesus or bearded Jesus or whoever you want.”—Will Ferrell, Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby No one watches a Will Ferrell movie for an accurate theology of prayer, but if they wanted a general idea of how many North Americans approach […]
The Lord’s Prayer
In honor of Queen Elizabeth II’s ninety-second birthday, a concert featuring various notable performers was held at the Royal Albert Hall in May of this year. One of the performers, Shawn Mendes, went on to describe his brief meeting with the queen as terribly awkward: “I was just standing there—you’re not meant to talk to […]
Fierce Mind and Brave Spirit: Jeanne, Queen of the Reformation
She had a temper—molto fantastico!—complained the Catholic ambassador from Florence; and in 1528 when she was born, her parents (King Henry and Queen Marguerite d’Albret of Navarre in southwestern France) likely wished for a son after neighboring royal rivals from Spain scoffed at their newborn female heir: “The cow has brought forth a sheep.”1 Little […]
A Praying Church
It’s no secret the church in America is struggling. We’ve lost the cultural wars, and our kids are being seduced by the siren call of secularism. It’s rare to find a family where I live in the Northeast where all the grown children of Christian parents are believers. Having lost the cultural high ground, we […]
Quotes on Prayer
It is a good thing to let prayer be the first business of the morning and the last at night. Guard yourself carefully against those false, deluding ideas which tell you, “Wait a little while. I will pray in an hour; first I must attend to this or that.” Such thoughts get you away from […]
Liturgical Prayer: Words That Enrich the Heart of the Church
A phenomenon that continues throughout evangelicalism is the juxtaposing of unaided, private, individual prayer with liturgical prayer, as if the two related like oil and water. The former is seen as lively, earnest, and Holy Spirit-prompted, whereas the latter is frequently depicted as dead, perfunctory, and contrived. Wherever this contrasts exists, “free, from the heart” […]
Christian Living
Explore All
Help! Saved but Still Sinning
Sanctification isn’t effortless. The act of dying to sin implies spiritual battle and life-long war against sin. Living unto righteousness implies costly, intensive labor that daily says “no” to sin and “yes” to Christlikeness. So what do we do when we fail yet again? How can we overcome feelings of failure, defeat, and self-loathing when we sin?
Fearing Death Isn’t a Sin. Here’s Why.
“To the one who is afraid of death, dear brother or sister, Don’t let your fear turn into faithlessness, but instead offer it to God.” Jesus’s death and resurrection have transformed what death means for the Christian. Pastor Adriel shares that feeling fear at the approach of death is not automatically sinful, however, the real […]
The Weight of Steadfastness
What if the discomfort we’ve avoided—the very trial we’ve begged God to remove—is the instrument our loving Father is using to bring us to completion, the place where lasting joy is found?
Assurance in the Shadow of Doubt
The coexistence of assurance and doubt is not a contradiction, but a reflection of the Christian life lived between justification and glorification. True assurance rests not in the strength of one’s faith, but in the object of that faith—Jesus Christ—and the presence of doubt, while unsettling, does not nullify genuine belief.
