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Chapel Message – 17 September
Seth Starkey is the RUF Pastor at Belhaven University here in Jackson. He delivered an excellent sermon at last week’s chapel (“Christ Centered Weakness” 2 Corinthians 12:9-10), and the audio is available here.
Read MoreIs there a finer contemporary essayist than Joseph Epstein? This morning I read his essay “The Kindergarchy: Every Child a Dauphin,” in which he reflects upon the sad outcomes of a society in which children rule, and are pampered and spoiled like “direct descendants of the Sun King.” As he’s wont to do, Epstein mixes social commentary with humor. I chuckled at this personal anecdote, I suppose from the 1940s: “I recall only once telling my mother that I was bored. ‘Oh,’ she said, a furtive smile on her lips, ‘why don’t you bang your head against the wall. That’ll take your mind off your boredom.’ I never mentioned boredom again.” – in Joseph Epstein, A Literary Education and Other…
Read MoreA leader among French Protestants, Antoine de Chandieu (1534-1591) fled to Geneva after the bloodshed of St. Bartholomew’s Day and was added to the Company of Pastors. One of his prayers: “O God, you who are powerful and awesome, you who are always the same, look thus upon my captivity. Change my weakness into power, my fear into joy and confidence, my servitude into freedom.” – from Scott M. Manetsch, Calvin’s Company of Pastors: Pastoral Care and the Emerging Reformed Church, 1536-1609 (Oxford: 2013), 58.
Read MoreJohn Stott reflects on the life of Charles Simeon, one of my heroes of Christian ministry. In 1985 I ran across Simeon’s name for the first time while reading Stott’s Between Two Worlds. He referenced Simeon several times, so I bought Hugh Evan Hopkins Charles Simeon of Cambridge to learn more. Later I read the fine biographies of Moule and Carus, and many of Simeon’s sermons. During his 54 years at Holy Trinity Church in Cambridge (1782-1836) some 1100 future ministers sat under his ministry. Distinguished historian Thomas Macauley observed that his influence was greater than any English bishop or archbishop. Any student preparing for ministry will benefit by studying the life of this remarkable pastor and preacher.
Read MoreAt RTS I’m preparing to teach again on Bunyan’s The Pilgrim’s Progress, and am finding Derek Thomas’s lectures immensely enjoyable and edifying. Years ago I was introduced to Alexander Whyte’s magnificent Bunyan Characters in The Pilgrim’s Progress. Any reader wanting faithful guides as he journeys through Bunyan need not look further than Thomas and Whyte.
Read MoreAlexander Whyte on prayer: “When reading and meditation and prayer do once begin to come in on a man, they make great inroads both upon his hours of work, and his hours of recreation, and even upon his hours of sleep. It is not that the Hearer of prayer has any need of our hours… He has always plenty of time. He inhabits eternity. He is always waiting to be gracious. It is we who need time to prepare our hearts to seek God. And it takes some men a long time, and a retired, and an uninterrupted time to get their minds and their hearts into the true frame for prayer and for the presence of God… As life…
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