Tony Reinke recently took a vacation which featured, among other things, a tour of Crossway Books. Our church uses the ESV and I believe every book I see published by Crossway is helpful and beneficial in some way. If you are in Chicago, I’m sure they would love to have you stop in. Tony does us a great service, though in this photo tour of the place.

The women of GirlTalk are interviewing Mary Mohler, wife of Southern Seminary President Al Mohler. Read the intro, Part 1 and Part 2.

I was really intrigued and took the test myself. Tim Ellsworth tipped me off to this. Apparently, students at Harvard didn’t crack 70% on this test. Read the story from USA today on how college students struggled on this history test, then take the test for yourself.

Since I am working on a series on Mondays on conflict, I would highly recommend you give a listen to C.J.’s sermon “Cravings and Conflict.” It is available as free audio now on the Sovereign Grace Website.

Last Monday, we began a short series on conflict and today and I want to point you to the reality of the Gospel. In his book The Gospel for Real Life, Jerry Bridges speaks of reconciliation like this:

When Jesus satisfied the justice of God and propitiated the wrath of God, He did all that was required to remove the enmity of God toward us. By His death He bridged the vast gulf of divine alienation between us and objectively restored us to a position of friendship and favor with God. But again we must keep in mind that it was God, the offended party, who sent His Son to reconcile us to Himself. As Paul wrote in Romans 5:10, “When we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son.”

As we are mindful in conflict of the Gospel, we can press on through any difficulty with the example of our Lord.

Paul Tripp recently used the following illustration to point us to the good life God desires for us in Psalm 27.

Imagine a little child running to the house once afternoon and saying to his mom, “Mommy, I am hungry…I want a candy bar, a can of soda, and a bowl of ice cream.” Now pretend that you respond, “I’ll make you a peanut butter sandwich with some apple slices on the side.” There’s a good possibility that your child won’t run over to his neighbor friend’s house and say, “You won’t believe what a good Mom I have…I asked for unhealthy treats and she responded by giving me things that were much better.” Probably the more likely scenario is that the child would immediately protest to his mother, “I don’t want peanut butter…I want candy…why can’t I have candy?” At this moment your child doesn’t think of you as the definition of parental goodness!

Being confident of the goodness of the Lord shouldn’t be confused with an assumption that because God is good, he’ll give me the things that I’ve set my heart on. In his grace, God is freeing you from the small confines of your little definition of what’s good so that you can experience the huge and satisfying good that he’s planned for you. Grace welcomes me to experience what is eternally right, true and good. Grace invites me to good that I could never have imagined, deserved, or earned.

Let your heart leap today toward your good God.

Thabiti points us to the greatest sin ever planned…

“The greatest sin that was ever committed in the history of the world… was planned by God, namely the death of His Son.”

This was the concluding comment by John Piper during a recent time at Wheaton. He preached a sermon entitled “Treasuring Christ and the Call to Suffer” Part 3.

For this week’s free sermon of the week, I saw that Piper had a sermon available (and all the audio/manuscripts are free at Desiring God) on Psalm 67, which happens to be the theme of our Missions Festival starting this weekend. The sermon is entitled Let the Nations Be Glad. Enjoy!

Who is this guy? Well, it would be worth your time to check out. Josh Harris recentely interviewed him. You can read these interviews: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3

Tony Reinke recently reviewed Tullian’s recently written book, Do I Know God. This looks like good stuff.

For today’s Marriage Monday segment, I am going to begin a brief series on conflict. We all face it. Conflict exists in most any authentic relationship we have. This is especially highlighted when it comes to marriage. James 4:1 asks: “What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you?” This is such a revealing thing. Conflict begins in the heart of people. It doesn’t come because someone did something to us. We are not helpless victims. For instance, if you say, I have a problem with that person because of what they did to me. What you are probably admitting is that you have a selfish desire to save face. Pride is at work in you to protect your own honor, therefore, you are going to have conflict with this person because of what they’ve done.

Not all conflict is bad. For instance, when you have been sinned against, it is a great opportunity to rehearse the Gospel and all that God has done for you in Christ. When we are the instigators and sin agaist someone, it is a reminder that we are in need of forgiveness just as God in Christ has forgiven us. Conflict is no small matter.

This is especially true in marriage. We need to be loving by being patient, kind, tenderhearted, forgiving. We need to be longsuffering. We need to be aware of how our own sinful hearts are at work to create conflict. As we begin to understand our own hearts, conflict will be squelched in way that distinctly brings glory to God.

(more to come on this next week…)