Links for the Weekend (2023-10-13)

Each Friday, I’ll post links to 3–5 resources from around the web you may want to check out.

Beware the Corrosive Quest for Respectability

Here’s a bracing exhortation for Christians not to seek out acceptance from the broader culture. The article lists some common arenas in which this temptation shows up and offers some advice for resisting.

Whatever credibility your constant digs at “those other Christians” earns you in the eyes of cultural elites, it’ll all be lost the minute they find out you actually believe what the Bible says about sexuality or the exclusivity of Christ (among other things). That’s perhaps the greatest reason efforts at “respectability” are a fool’s errand. Even if you say and do all the right things, if you believe a few wrong things, respectability will be elusive and elite access will be denied.

Dad, Where Are You Going?

How does a father discuss his terminal cancer diagnosis with his young sons? Tim Albert writes about the ways God has helped him grapple with this question using Psalm 77.

My son’s innocent question strikes at the core of my fears. He hardly knows what cancer is, let alone that his dad has it. I’ve avoided the conversation to this point, but spend a significant portion of each day replaying what seems inevitable in the theater of my mind: life cut short and my boys growing up without their father. 

Seven Blessings for Empty-Handed Believers

Colin Smith writes about what it looks like to turn to the Lord and let go of our pride.

People who feel they have something to offer God come to him with their hands full, but as long as our hands are full, we are not in a position to receive. As Thomas Watson says, “If the hand is full of pebbles, it cannot receive gold.”

People who are poor in spirit drop the pebbles because they want the gold, and they know that it can only be received by empty-handed believers. When you know that you have nothing to offer God, you are in a position to receive all that he offers to you. When you accept that you cannot claim his blessing as a right, you are in a position to receive it as a gift.

Note: Washington Presbyterian Church and the editors of this blog do not necessarily endorse all content produced by the individuals or groups referenced here.