Author: Josh King

Tolle Lege: Thriving at College

Readability:  1

Length: 317

Author: Alex Chediak

I wish this book had been published before I started college and that someone had given it to me. It is the book I will give to all high school graduates, and I will recommend it to all college students as well. Alex is an “insider”, a former student who is now a professor, giving you mature wisdom from both angles. Thriving at College deals with faith, friendships, finances, family, academics, and character; every crucial area receives thorough treatment.

Each of the ten chapters deals with a common mistake made by college students. Here is the table of contents:

PART 1: COLLEGE MATTERS

  • Common Mistake #1: Chucking Your Faith
  • Common Mistake #2: Treating College as if It Were High School

PART 2: RELATIONSHIPS MATTER

  • Common Mistake #3: Not Being Intentional
  • Common Mistake #4: Distorting Dating and Romance
  • Common Mistake #5: Refusing to Grow Up

PART 3: CHARACTER MATTERS

  • Common Mistake #6: Being a Flake
  • Common Mistake #7: Living out of Balance

PART 4: ACADEMICS MATTER

  • Common Mistake #8: Being Too Passive or Too Cocky
  • Common Mistake #9: Living for Grades
  • Common Mistake #10: Wasting Opportunities

I made the decision to go to college almost by accident. What else was I supposed to do after high school? I was a fairly good student, but I lacked the maturity to make that really huge decision in a constructive, sensible manner. Frankly, my college years could have been better. Today, I look back on my younger self in college and wish I could have a cup of coffee with him. I wish I could give him somehard- earned advice.

That’s why I’m writing this book. I can’t take my younger self out to coffee. There’s no time machine for that. But as a college professor today, I have the chance to observe students and how they live their lives. I’m amazed at how many of them remind me of my former self. This book is, in essence, an attempt at taking you out to Starbucks and telling you what I’ve learned about the college years— and, most  important, telling you how to make your college season the best years of your life (so far). I cannot tell you how much I wish someone had told me these things when I was in college.

The Sweet Dropper: All Esteemed, None Proud

God will have it thus in his wise dispensation, because he will have every man esteemed, and because he will have no man to be proud. He will humble his own to let them know that they stand in need of the prayers of the weakest. Every man in the church of God hath some gifts, that none should be despised; and none have all gifts, that none should presume over-much and be proud. In the church of God, in the body of Christ, there is no idle member. In the communion of saints there is none unprofitable. Every one can do good in his kind.  – Richard Sibbes, An Exposition of 2 Corinthians 1

More Than Pizza

Over the past year I’ve conducted dozens of interviews with 20-somethings who have walked away from their Christian faith. Among the most surprising findings was this: nearly all of these “leavers” reported having positive experiences in youth group. I recall my conversation with one young man who described his journey from evangelical to atheist. He had nothing but vitriol for the Christian beliefs of his childhood, but when I asked him about youth group, his voice lifted. “Oh, youth group was a blast! My youth pastor was a great guy.”

I was confused. I asked Josh Riebock, a former youth pastor and author of mY Generation, to solve the riddle: if these young people had such a good time in youth group, why did they ditch their faith shortly after heading to college?

His response was simple. “Let’s face it,” he said. “There are a lot more fun things to do at college than eat pizza.”

Read Drew Dyck’s full article here.

The Sweet Dropper: Treasure up Observations

This should teach us then, this holy practice, to lay up observations of God’s dealing, and to take them as so many pawns and pledges to move God for the time to come to regard us. It is wondrous pleasing to him. It is no argument to prevail if we come to men, to say, you have done this for me, therefore you will ; because man hath a finite power which is soon drawn dry. But God is infinite. He is a spring. He can create new. What he hath done he can do, and more too. He is where he was at the first, and will be to the end of the world. He is never at a loss. Therefore it is a strong argument to go to God, and say, ‘Lord, thou art my God from the womb,’ thou hast delivered me from such a danger, and such an exigence. When I knew not what to do, thou madest open a way. I see by evident signs it was thy goodness, thou art alway like thyself, to be the same God now. Therefore we should treasure up observations of God’s dealing with us. 

It should be the wisdom of every Christian to be well read in the story of his own life, and to return back in his thoughts what God hath done for him, how God hath dealt with him for the time past, what he hath wrought in him by his Holy Spirit.  – Richard Sibbes, An Exposition of 2 Corinthians 1

How To Celebrate Memorial Day

Kevin DeYoung offers some great reflections. Here is the conclusion:

We should pray for service men and women in our congregations. We should pray for the President. We should pray for the just cause to triumph over the evil one. We are not moral relativists. We do not believe just because all people are sinners and all nations are sinful that no person or no nation can be more righteous or more wicked than another. God may be on America’s side in some (not all) her endeavors.

But please think twice before putting on a Star Spangled gala in church this Sunday. I love to hear the national anthem and “God Bless America” and “My Country, Tis of Thee,” but not in church where the nations gather to worship the King of all peoples. I love to see the presentation of colors and salute our veterans, but these would be better at the Memorial Day parade or during a time of remembrance at the cemetery. Earthly worship should reflect the on-going worship in heaven. And while there are many Americans singing glorious songs to Jesus there, they are not singing songs about the glories of America. We must hold to the traditions of the Apostles in our worship, not the traditions of American history. The church should not ask of her people what is not required in Scripture. So how can we ask the Koreans and Chinese and Mexicans and South Africans in our churches to pledge allegiance to a flag that is not theirs? Are we gathered under the banner of Christ or another banner? Is the church of Jesus Christ–our Jewish Lord and Savior–for those draped in the red, white, and blue or for those washed in the blood of the Lamb?

In some parts of the church, every hint of patriotism makes you a jingoistic idolater. You are allowed to love every country except your own. But in other parts of the church, true religion blends too comfortably into civil religion. You are allowed to worship in our services as long as you love America as much as we do. I don’t claim to have arrived at the golden mean, but I imagine many churches could stand to think more carefully about their theology of God and country. Churches should be glad to have their members celebrate Memorial Day with gusto this Monday. We should be less sanguine about celebrating it with pomp and circumstance on Sunday.

Book Length Responses to Love Wins

Some book length responses to Rob Bell’s Love Wins are already being published by good authors such as Michael Wittmer, and Mark Galli. But I am especially excited that Francis Chan is writing one. The humility, earnestness, and compassion he expresses in the video below are part of what generates this excitement. But it is his plea for prayer that especially excites me. This isn’t because of what this communicates about Chan, though that is admirable and to imitated. No, what excites me is how God can answer these prayers. I am praying that Erasing Hell will be Biblically faithful, God-honoring, and outsell Love Wins. I am praying that this book be used by God to turn evil for good, to turn hearts from heresy to truth, and to turn evangelicals and unbelievers to the evangel.

The Sweet Sropper: Deliverance by Death Greater Than From Death

There is a partial deliverance, and a total deliverance. There is a deliverance from this and that trouble, and there is a deliverance from all troubles. God delivers us most when we think he delivers least; for we think how doth he deliver his children when we see them taken away by death, and ofttimes are massacred? That is one way of delivering them. God by death takes them from all miseries. They are out of the reach of their enemies. Death delivers them from all miseries of this life, both inward of sin, and outward of trouble. All are determined in death. Therefore, God when he doth not deliver them from death, he delivers them by death, and takes them to his heavenly kingdom.  – Richard Sibbes, An Exposition of 2 Corinthians 1

The Sweet Dropper: No Care for the Beam When You Have the Sun

What doth a man lose when he trusts in God, though he lose all the world? Hath he not him that made the world at the first, and can make another if he please? If a man lose all, and have God, as he hath that trusts in him, and in his word; for God will not deny his word and truth. He that trusts in God hath him, and if he have him, what if he be stripped of all? He can make another world with a word of his mouth. Other things are but a beam to him; what need a man care for a beam, that hath the sun?  – Richard Sibbes, An Exposition of 2 Corinthians 1

Hell… No?

I have nothing new to add to controversy concerning Rob Bell’s newest book, Love Wins. But I do want to make accessible to you many of the resources I have found helpful, insightful, and most importantly, Biblical.

Reviews:

Kevin DeYoung: The most thorough review dealing with the problems found in Love Wins under the following headings: historical, exegetical, eschatological, Christological, and Gospel problems. (21 printed pages)

Albert Mohler: Shows how indeed, as Bell claims, that he is saying nothing new, and that is the tragedy. Here we have the same old heresies rehashed, the heresies especially apparent in Protestant Liberalism. (7 printed pages)

Russell Moore: Deals with Bell making “blood” is nothing more than a cultural metaphor. (3 printed pages)

Denny Burk: A great chapter by chapter review that clearly sums up the errors Bell espouses. (11 printed pages)

Tim Challies: A clear review that deals with the big ideas of Love Wins. (6 printed pages)

Greg Gilbert: Deals well with the meaning of aion as meaning “eternal” in many contexts. (3 printed pages)

Trevin Wax: Writes of what the furor over Bell’s book reveals about Evangelicalism. (2 printed pages)

Michael Horton: A great chapter by chapter review that shows many of Bell’s faulty presuppositions. (16 printed pages)

Carl Trueman: Deals explicitly with Bell’s poor quotation of Luther in his defence. (5 printed pages)

Audio / Video:

The Gospel Coalition Discussion Panel: A discussion moderated by Kevin DeYoung, including D. A. Carson, Tim Keller, Crawford Loritts, and Stephen Um.

Southern Seminary Discussion Panel: Alber Mohler, Russell Moore, Denny Burk, and Justin Taylor discuss the book.

Unbelievable: A British Radio Program host a discussion between Adrian Warnock and Rob Bell.

White Horse Inn: An interview with Kevin DeYoung.