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Just a few days after my husband’s passing, my phone rang. For the sake of protecting the guilty, let’s say the caller represented Shady Pines Old Folks Home. Me: “A personal care home? Is that one of those places where they cook your meals, clean your room, and even help you with bathing?” Shady: “It certainly is, Mrs. Clark. We can provide a wide range of services in your time of need.” Me: “Awesome. Sign me up.” My two college-age children wondered if grief had taken their mother’s sense of reason. It had not. Neither had it taken her sense of humor. Shady: “Alright Mrs. Clark, I need some more information from you, starting with your date of birth.” Me: “May 15, 1963.” Shady: “1963? Mrs. Clark, did you mean to say 63?” Me: “Sure did. I’m nifty at 50. . . Hello? You there?” And so began the long list of encounters with folks who had little understanding of widows and our needs. According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, one-third of all women who become widowed are younger than age 60, and half of those widowed become so by age 65. In fact, seven out of ten baby boomers can expect to outlive their husbands. Here are nine things you need to know about the ever-increasing member of society, the widow: 1. A widow’s deepest pains last longer than a year. Immediately after a death, the church community is adept at responding with flowers or a casserole but far less gifted in maintaining a ministry to her long-term. Her experience can feel like major surgery—a radical amputation, to be specific. She may be numb for several months. After the cards and letters stop, the visits drop off, and friends return to their normal lives, her hardest work has just begun. 2. A grieving widow who lives alone may go several days without hearing another human voice, especially months after the initial funeral. Emails and text messages are good; however, phone calls and visits may be better. While this may not seem like the most efficient use of your time, efficiency and effectiveness are sometimes mutually exclusive. 3. A grieving widow’s pain is unique and volatile. What encourages one woman may be painfully unhelpful to another. Grief is like a virus that waxes and wanes with intensity. Emotional mine fields such as these may require intimate knowledge of the bereaved. A close friend might be better suited to visit than a newly hired pastor. Don’t confuse compassion for a church acquaintance with a call to take personal action. If you don’t know the widow well, allow one of her close friends to direct your ministry efforts. 4. A grieving widow is often physically and emotionally exhausted. Don’t call her late at night or early in the morning. Be patient if she is slow in responding to your acts of kindness. Graciously accept her “no thank you” when she says she’s not up to going to dinner. She isn’t refusing help or harboring bitterness. She may simply need rest. 5. A grieving widow loves her children. Watching her children suffer is a misery that compounds grief and one in which the body of Christ is uniquely suited to offer comfort. The day of my husband’s funeral, students from my children’s college (Covenant) drove more than four hours one-way just to be with my kids. The sight of several pews packed with young adults will forever stay with us. One of my son’s professors eats breakfast with my son nearly every Friday. Loving a widow’s children is loving the widow. 6. A grieving widow often feels second (or third) to everyone else. Months after my husband, Jim, died, an ice storm crippled our city. Power outages citywide and downed trees littered homes and businesses. The damage was so widespread that I couldn’t possibly ask church friends to leave their own homes to address mine. But leave they did. A tree had fallen through the roof of one church friend’s home, yet he and his dad headed first to my place. “I’m waiting on the insurance company to call me,” he said. “I can wait here working a chainsaw as easily as pace the floor there.” 7. A grieving widow’s life is not a tragedy but a gift. When she is ready, encourage her to serve. In many cases, the death of her spouse did not hamper her gifting. Quite the contrary, it is part of how God heals her. Don’t look at her through the lens of her loss, but rather chose to see God’s faithfulness as she deepens her trust in her Savior. 8. A grieving widow’s finances may dramatically change after the loss of the primary breadwinner. More than half of elderly widows now living in poverty were not poor before the death of their husbands. She may have life insurance policies, long-term savings plans, and family to lean on, yet still find her finances overwhelming. After my husband’s death, two of his friends—one an accountant, the other a senior bank vice president—helped me work out a budget based on my lower income level. And these two did not treat me like an obligation. Every time they left my home, a piece of my burden went with them. 9. God loves a grieving widow. He does not despise her tears nor shudder when she doubts her faith in the darkness. The widow knows much of Jacob’s wrestling with God. He walked with a limp the remainder of his earthly life, but gained a changed heart. A grieving widow needs gospel-drenched compassion and not pity. While compassion walks beside the bereaved, pity stands off at a safe distance. The day my husband collapsed, my boss—a physician and head of a busy community clinic—canceled his appointments immediately and came to the hospital. He looked after my in-laws with uncanny tenderness and prayed with them. When my children came in from out of town, he wrapped his arms around them both and shed tears as I told them their dad was not expected to survive. To offer compassion in any circumstance is to share in another’s suffering, and in so doing, we mirror the suffering of Christ on our behalf. Gaye Clark works as a cardiac nurse at University Hospital in Augusta, Georgia, and writes in her free time. She has two adult children, Anna and Nathan. Re-printed from Gospel Coalition. Used by permission.

I would like to introduce David Jenkins, Executive Director of Servants of Grace Ministries as a guest author of this powerful article. Read his insightful thoughts: Recently a new survey commissioned by a nonprofit organization called Proven Men Ministries and conducted by the Barna Group took a national representative sample of 388 self-identified Christian adult men. The statistics are alarming and paint a picture of the serious problem that is addiction to pornography. The statistics for Christian men between 18 and 30 years old are particularly striking: 77% look at pornography at least monthly 36% view pornography on a daily basis 32% admit being addicted to pornography (and another 12% think they may be) The statistics for middle-aged Christian men (ages 31 to 49) are no less disturbing: 77% looked at pornography while at work in the past three months 64% view pornography at least monthly 18% admit being addicted to pornography (and another 8% think they may be) Even married Christian men are falling prey to pornography and extramarital sexual affairs at alarming rates: 55% look at pornography at least monthly 35% had an extramarital sexual affair while married These statistics are alarming; in fact they can be downright discouraging. The porn addict lives in a world where they go through a cycle of feeling sorry for what they did, but never coming to see the horror and complete depravity of what they have done. The statistics, as I stated earlier, paint a disturbing picture. They demonstrate that we need to help porn addicts understand the seriousness of their sin, the nature of true biblical repentance, and turning away from sexual sin to Jesus Christ. 6 Ingredients of Repentance The great Puritan author, Thomas Watson, once said there are six ingredients for true repentance. 1. The first is sight of sin, whereby a person comes to himself (Luke 15:17) and clearly views his lifestyle as sinful. If we fail to see our own sin, we rarely, if ever, are motivated to repent. 2. The second ingredient for true repentance is sorrow for sin (Psalm 38:18). We need to feel the nails of the cross in our souls as we sin. Repentance includes both godly grief and holy agony (2 Corinthians 7:10). The fruit of repentance is revealed in genuine, anguishing sorrow over the offense itself, not just the consequences of it. Sorrow for sin is seen in the ongoing righteous actions it produces. True repentance lingers in the soul and not just on the lips. 3. The third ingredient is confession of sin. The humble sinner voluntarily passes judgment on himself as he sincerely admits to the specific sins of his heart. We must not relent of our confession until all of it is freely and fully admitted. We must pluck up any hidden root of sin within us. “Beware lest there be among you a root bearing poisonous and bitter fruit” (Deuteronomy 28:19). 4. The fourth ingredient for true repentance is shame for sin. The color of repentance is blushing red. Repentance causes a holy bashfulness. Ezra 9:6 says, “O my God, I am ashamed and blush to lift my face to you, my God, for our iniquities have risen higher than our heads, and our guilt has mounted up to the heavens.” The repenting prodigal was so ashamed of his sin that he did not feel he deserved to be a son anymore (Luke 15:21). Sin makes us shamefully naked and deformed in God’s eyes and puts Christ to shame, the One who took the scorn of the cross on Himself. 5. The fifth ingredient in repentance is hatred of sin. We must hate our sin to the core. We hate sin more deeply when we love Jesus more fully. Repentance begins in the love of God and ends in the hatred of sin. True repentance loathes sin. 6. Finally, the sixth ingredient of repentance is the turning away from sin and returning to the Lord with all your heart (Joel 2:12). This turning from sin implies a notable change, “performing deeds in keeping with their repentance” (Acts 26:20). “Thus says the Lord God: Repent and turn away from your idols and turn away your faces from all your abominations” (Ezekiel 14:6). We are called to turn away from all our abominations, not just the obvious ones or the ones that create friction in others. The goal of repentance is not to manufacture peace among others with perfunctory repentance, but rather to turn to God wholly and completely. This repentance most importantly is not just a turning away from sin. It also necessarily involves a turning in “repentance toward God and of faith in our Lord Jesus Christ” (Acts 20:21). Here is the joy that is found in repentance. “It is God’s kindness that leads us to repentance” (Romans 2:4). We rejoice that Christ has done so much for us and continues to do for us. By understanding the seriousness of sin and biblical repentance, we can come to understand that there is hope and freedom for the captives. Jesus came to set the captives free. While we live in a world that is full of bad news, in the midst of the bad news of our sin there is hope and healing from sexual sin. Look to Jesus—He is the cure for sexual brokenness. Jesus is in the business of setting the captives free through His finished work. No matter your sexual history, Jesus alone can make you pure again. Turn to Him, and trust in Him. He is all you need.

People have a desire to be know by others. All of us have an appetite to be known, but the thing about an appetite is it can never fully and finally be satisfied. The more we feed it, the more we crave it. There is no amount of fame or success for your appetite to be satisfied. At what point do you say, “I am known enough.” This desire starts when we are young because we all wanted to be famous with our fathers. We see in our children that there is something in them that wants to be known for something and known by somebody. In ministry, we can get caught up on numbers ad what others think. We feel bad when attendance decreases. We might think self-conscious thoughts while we preach on stage. There is no amount of applause, there is no amount of being known that will fully satisfy you. Instead your appetite grows. 3 Laws of Applause What is exceptional the first time will be expected the next time. Exceptional becomes “expectional”. A lot of leaders become so enamored with being known. Applause is intoxicating, and intoxicated people don’t make very good decisions. Those most applauded for, feel most entitled to. Applause is addictive. If you get it once, you want it again. You may even be tempted to manufacture it. Amen? So how do we make sure that we don’t fall victim to the laws of applause? Let’s learn from John the Baptist. Mark 1:4-9 John appeared, baptizing in the wilderness and proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. And all the country of Judea and all Jerusalem were going out to him and were being baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. Now John was clothed with camel’s hair and wore a leather belt around his waist and ate locusts and wild honey. And he preached, saying, “After me comes he who is mightier than I, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to stoop down and untie. I have baptized you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.” In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. John 3:25-30 Now a discussion arose between some of John’s disciples and a Jew over purification. And they came to John and said to him, “Rabbi, he who was with you across the Jordan, to whom you bore witness—look, he is baptizing, and all are going to him.” John answered, “A person cannot receive even one thing unless it is given him from heaven.  You yourselves bear me witness, that I said, ‘ I am not the Christ, but I have been sent before him. ’ The one who has the bride is the bridegroom. The friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly at the bridegroom’s voice. Therefore this joy of mine is now complete. He must increase, but I must decrease. ” The whole country of Judea and all of Jerusalem came to see John the Baptist. Apparently, thousands and thousands of people showed up in that dry, dusty environment just to hear him. This is not an easy place to get to, but he attracted thousands. He is a phenomenon. He is known. But with all of this attention on him, he chooses to turn the attention from himself to Jesus. When John did this, he lost two disciples to Jesus. When people confronted John the Baptist about him losing his fame, John replied, “A person can only receive what is given to him.” John the Baptist knew when his time was up and was not going to try to manufacture what he had before. Surviving fame is remembering who it is from and who it is for. Your appetite for fame will never be satisfied by a number but a name – a who not a how. John the Baptist got it right.” catalystconference.com/atlanta

Me. Myself. And I. The three people we tend to care about the most in western civilization. Since the fall of Adam and Eve, the sickness of self-absorption has infected all of humanity, but it has particularly affected segments of the population that have adopted cultural values that revolve around the preservation of personal happiness. We are narcissists. In their book, The Narcissism Epidemic, psychologists Jean M. Twenge and W. Keith Campbell explore the rise of narcissism in American culture… Understanding the narcissism epidemic is important because its long-term consequences are destructive to society. American culture’s focus on self-admiration has caused a flight from reality to the land of grandiose fantasy. We have phony rich people (with interest-only mortgages and piles of debt), phony beauty (with plastic surgery and cosmetic procedures), phony athletes (with performance-enhancing drugs), phony celebrities (via reality TV and YouTube), phony genius students (with grade inflation), a phony national economy (with $18 trillion of government debt), phony feelings of being special among children (with parenting and education focused on self-esteem), and phony friends (with the social networking explosion). All this fantasy might feel good, but, unfortunately, reality always wins. The mortgage meltdown and the resulting financial crisis are just one demonstration of how inflated desires eventually crash to earth. So how do you know when you’re a carrier of this deadly disease? Well, first of all, you are. All of us, like sheep, have strayed away. We have left God’s paths to follow our own. Yet the Lord laid on him the sins of us all.– I saiah 53:7 NLT Obviously, some of us are affected by the narcissism more than others. There are plenty of people in our society who commit selfless acts of kindness on a daily basis and even heroic self-sacrificing deeds on occasion. We support causes, give to charity, and try to protect the people we love. But on the whole, we’re still highly concerned with protecting and providing for ourselves above anyone else. Thankfully, narcissism is a disease with a cure. But few people will discover the antidote and among those who hear about its healing power will be willing to swallow it entirely, having counted the cost of doing so. The cure for our narcissism epidemic is found in the cross. Jesus put it this way: Jesus told his disciples, “The nation’s leaders, the chief priests, and the teachers of the Law of Moses will make the Son of Man suffer terribly. They will reject him and kill him, but three days later he will rise to life.” Then Jesus said to all the people: If any of you want to be my followers, you must forget about yourself. You must take up your cross each day and follow me. If you want to save your life, you will destroy it. But if you give up your life for me, you will save it. What will you gain, if you own the whole world but destroy yourself or waste your life? Luke 9:22-25 CEV Practice self-forgetfulness. Take up your cross. Daily. Follow Jesus. That’s it. Stop focusing on your own wants and desires above all others and instead, embrace your cross on a daily basis and follow the example of Jesus in every possible way. And what does it mean to take up your cross? Well, it’s not about trying harder, doing better, or improving self. That’s all junk that came from our narcissism to begin with. Taking up our cross is a choice we must consciously make, but the cross we bear isn’t ours to choose. Just as Jesus submitted himself to every single detail of the painful plan of God for his life down to the last drop of blood he spilled on the cross, so we must choose to recognize that God himself is the very center of our universe and His will supersedes ours in every way. Whether life or death, happiness or suffering, taking up our cross involves us saying, as Jesus did in the garden on the eve of his death, “whatever you will, God.” Think of it this way. You don’t fly to Chicago. You can try, but your arms will get rather tired. What you can do is decide to get on the plane and allow yourself to go where the pilot takes you. Furthermore, the choice to take up our cross and follow Jesus is both a one-time decision as well as a daily series of decisions. I’m still learning to follow Him. I’m still fighting the remaining effects of the disease of narcissism. Thankfully, when I fail, I get to fall on the inexhaustible grace of God, look back to Jesus, and start following him again. The antidote is within reach. It’s free for the taking. Salvation is a gift from the Father of the One who died to make our redemption possible. Re-printed from www.brandoncox.com. Visit www.gracehillschurch.com.

Success has been accorded an endless array of definitions. Some are crafted to make failure seem more like success so that we can limp through life and fail without remorse or guilt. Other definitions are quite lofty, written to give us opportunity achieve in a manner that has little to do with the achievement and everything to do with restoring blunted self-esteems. Sometimes definitions are crafted as we go along, granting us permission to fluidly and nonchalantly alter the definition of success in order to form-fit whatever the outcome of our choices have been, thereby permitting us full license to define the outcome in whatever way suits us. Then there are other times when the definition of success is modified to diminish the works of those we’ve come to abhor and elevate those upon whom our favor has fallen. Some definitions of success are those shaped by the shifting pen of political correctness, or the placating tenets of the culture, or by the gnawing need for acceptance, or formed from the dictates of a particular social grouping that demands adherence to a prescribed set of standards. Whatever and wherever their source, a dizzying array of definitions abound. And it this mad array of definitions that sends us scurrying in a million different directions in order to be successful in whatever way success is defined at the moment. In the end, success becomes more defined by figuring out exactly what success is rather than actually fulfilling the definition. Why Success? It is interesting that success, in whatever manner it is defined, has come to define our worth and value. Success appears to have become the litmus test as to the credibility of our existence and the gauge of our value. Success has evolved into the exclusive commodity by which we ascribe value to ourselves and others. It is the thing that gives us status, grants us credibility, authenticates what we say, lends weight to our opinions, and awards us with the sense of a life well lived. It is the crown jewel of our existence, something to be vigorously pursued and rigorously obtained at all costs, for not doing so is a life squandered, opportunity lost, and self-esteem decimated. Success becomes so acutely defined and so irrevocably defining that we seldom entertain any other possible definition. We find ourselves so entangled in the culturally mandated definition and so absorbed in the achieving of that definition that the endeavor becomes inordinately consuming. We have no time to question the mark of success, and if we did we fear that the cultural definition might be correct and that our lives will have forever run amuck because we missed the cherished mark. Therefore, given that the defining scale of success has assumed such a dominant role in our culture, and given that we presume there to be some golden definition out there we must find a definition for it, otherwise we have no precise framework by which to determine our success or lack thereof. Once we feel we’ve landed on the singular definition of success, we throw ourselves into the chase for fear that our lives might devolve into obscurity, our legacy might be pathetic, and we ourselves remain contemptible. What We Do or Who We Are? Yet, the yardstick that we use to measure success is defined by what we do. It is measured by a series of accomplishments, the manner in which we have embellished life through those accomplishments, and the achievement of goals lofty behind the imagination of the common man and far beyond the reach of the hoards. It’s understanding what’s fundamentally achievable and then embracing the belief that success is defined as raising oneself significantly above that which is fundamentally achievable. It’s being intentional about ascending to some lofty escarpment that we ourselves had deemed impossible to surmount. In doing so, we evidence our worth as held up against the enormity of the task itself and the manner in which the everyday person accomplishes the task. If we can eclipse both, we feel that we have established our worth by virtue of these comparisons. Yet, the nature of such a mentality of success demands that we constantly achieve. It is an effort of insanely perpetual works that requires that we continually prove our worth as the previous achievement eventually fades sufficiently to demand a new one. Therefore, we become enslaved to achievements that demand nothing more than other achievements. With such an apparently irreconcilable flaw in thinking, it would be worthwhile to postulate that our worth must be based on something significantly more consistent and profoundly more fundamental. Value Based on Who We Are It would therefore be wise to consider the possibility that our worth is based on something so profound and unerringly rich that its worth singularly speaks for itself. It would make sense that our worth should be, and in reality is based on something that can’t be proven for no other reason than its value lies forever beyond our most magnificent achievements that would serve to even remotely evidence it. And that itself may be the great rub. Too often in life we want to control the things that define us. In the oddity of it all, we desperately want to discover and be obedient to what life says that defines our success while covertly crafting those very definitions behind the scenes. We can craft life, impose values, shift circumstances and modify a host of other variables that shape a definition of success in order to give us a maximum chance of success because we had a hand in determining what it is. Yet, we are entirely unable to define any manner of success that would rise to the level of value that we inherently possess. I would propose that next to God Himself, the thing of single greatest value is we ourselves. The priceless nature of a single human life, despite the manner in which we’ve blithely degraded that worth, is wholly immense. And this immensity is utterly inestimable on so many indescribable levels that proof stands as entirely irrelevant. Human beings stand as the most definitive accomplishment of creation, standing as the pinnacle of a creation that is indescribably marvelous in and of itself. We are the final touch of the cosmos themselves. We are the defining brush stroke of a creation that encompasses the galaxies, raised up mountains, gouged out canyons, threw birds into flight, painted fiery sunsets and spun the mesmerizing diversity of the seasons. We are God’s defining work. There can be no shade of arrogance or darkening of pride in such a reality as that would only serve to sadly mar us and leave us with a diminished countenance. Indeed, we should be inordinately humbled that we are God’s crowning achievement and that, aside from any purported success grants us inestimable worth. It is not about proving our worth through the sweaty efforts of success. It is about realizing successes of even the loftiest sort and boldest character could not in and of themselves prove our worth, for it is entirely inherent and undeniably priceless. It is in recognizing this precious reality that we work to achieve in life for the sheer pleasure of achievement, rather than as a despairing effort to establish our worth. We walk through life with vigor and tenacity out of a sense of worth, not out of some desperate effort to prove our worth. Life is engaged energized and inspired by our worth, rather than depleted in the pursuit of it. Our days are lived embracing the reality that our value is based on who we are, and to embrace that liberating reality is to embrace a life liberated. © 2015 Craig Lounsbrough, M.Div., Licensed Professional Counselor

“Sid, come to my office. We need to talk.” As Sid sat there wondering what was happening, the school official said, “Sid, I really like you. I believe in you. Yet, your grades aren’t cutting it here. You know it and I know it. Here is the good news. People with your character and values go on to be the CEOs of the straight A students. Yes, I am kicking you out of this college. Good luck.” Here is the irony to Sid’s story. Sid is now one of the largest donors to that school. He ended up being that CEO. In fact, a CEO of a Fortune 500 company. It wasn’t his grades that made him successful. It was what his parents put into him as a kid while he was in school that made him successful. 1: Read, read, read and when in doubt, read to your kids. Successful is… Sid was asked to leave his school because of his low grades. But he was a success because his parents taught him a love of learning and good life skills. A successful student isn’t defined by the grades on their report card. A successful student is one that: enjoys learning, is self-motivated, and connects the dots about others, like gratitude. Learning is a life-long journey. Life skills out-perform good grades. Reading is the Building Block Want to be an Attorney? You will have to read a lot. Want to be a Doctor, an Engineer, an Actor, or a Salesman? You will have to read a lot to be successful in your career. As my friend, Jeff Brown of Read to Lead, says, “Readers Lead and Leaders Read.” If you want to succeed above and beyond, reading is necessary. Encourage Reading by Reading Andrea’s favorite afternoon activity with her young children was to read a book for 20 minutes as she fell asleep on the coach. The kids joke that mom would read and start to slur her words as she fell asleep. The point is that Andrea made a routine to always find time to read, no matter how tired. Andrea would let the kids decide which books they wanted to read. (For full disclosure, the book, “Go, Dog, Go” was accidentally left outside during a thunderstorm and ruined, so she didn’t have to read it anymore.) When teaching reading to the kids, let them struggle and do it themselves. It will drive you crazy at times to help them with the word “that” for the 10,000th time their reading skills will grow much faster. When your child reads to you, overlook the mispronounced words. They will eventually get it. Better they believe they can read and enjoy the experience at a young age. Support Creativity by being Creative Crayons are cheap. Paper is cheap. Creativity is priceless. Give your kids lots of object to be creative with. Our kids love using the toilet paper rolls for all sorts of creative projects. It doesn’t need to be fancy or expensive for it to be fun to your kids. Your response to their projects is important to encourage them to explore more. Hanging the project on the wall or refrigerator is way more important than a perfect looking home. The tablet and phone will grab your children’s attention if this is what you grab first to entertain your kids. Grab crayons and craft paper first. Dream with your kids and watch them take off. Action Steps Find a time and create a habit to read to your young kids. Define a successful student as someone that loves reading and learning. Let them choose books that they want to read. Encourage them to practice reading and let them struggle through the words. Get crayons and craft items for your kids to create works of art. Parenting Tip/ Pocket Answer Readers will flourish. 2. Don’t buy a ticket to the Homework Dog and Pony Show How often did Dr. Leman help his kids with their homework? How often did Dr. Leman ask his kids if they finished their homework? His answers make sense, but do they really work? Find out in this episode. Dr. Kevin Leman never asked if his kids finished their homework. He keeps the tennis ball of life on their side of the court. So, they learn to be responsible for their own work. 1. It is their life and it is their homework, not yours. Let the teacher be the authority to get the work done. Your children will learn that they will be responsible for their work by others than mom and dad. When the report card comes home, Dr. Leman recommends saying to your kids, “I have a hard time understanding why, they send me YOUR report card. This is your report card. How do you feel about this report card?” I’ll never know if my kids are doing good or bad in school, if I don’t ask. Your kids want you to be engaged in their life. They will volunteer information about their school work. Your job is to show interest in their work. If they volunteer information, be positive and keep it their homework. Feel free to call the teacher and ask how you can help support the teacher to insure his school work gets done. What do I do if their grades are poor? The next time, they want to do or go somewhere, say, “Nope, we need to have this conversation about your grades. Within 4 years, a person will look at your grades from High School and will make inferences about you from those grades. If those grades are poor, they won’t want to accept you into college or a job. Are you happy with those grades? What do we need to do to get them up?” 2. School first, play second. Set the school first culture early. Get your child their own special spot to study. Set it up with their favorite pencil, good lighting and their touch. Set a specific time that homework starts, like 4 pm. This gives your kids the routine that I have my place, my stuff and a set time that school work gets done. Give your kid some time to play or decompress when the first get home from school, then encourage them to go to their spot and do their school work. Early on and later, put up their “work” on the frig. Show off their homework. 3. Don’t load the wagon so full. Make sure your child has enough time for the important things of life as well as the extra activities. Does your child have time to simply enjoy life? Does your child have time for his friends to come over? Does your child have enough time to get his school work done? Be pro-active in evaluating what does on the family wagon, so you kid’s can do the important things. Summation of podcasts by Dr. Leman. Used by permission. www.birthorderguy.com/podcast/046-3-no-brainer-ideas-to-make-your-child-a-successful-student/

I know a pastor in California who reversed his position on homosexuality. The pastor said that his shift coincided with his 15 year-old son’s announcement that he is gay. This is a situation every Christian should think through, now. At stake on the issue of a Christian sexual ethic is the Gospel of Jesus Christ. But what if, sitting across from you, is your child or grandchild? You will, without a doubt, have someone close to you in your family come out as gay or lesbian, if not already, then sometime in the future. How should a Christian parent or grandparent respond? One of the reasons this is such a crushing experience for many is because they assume that their alternatives are affirmation or alienation. I either give up my relationship with my child or I give up the Bible. The gospel never suggests this set of alternatives, and in fact demonstrates just the opposite. Every child, whether gay or straight, is oriented toward sin, and so are you. If your child or grandchild says he or she is gay, you shouldn’t act shocked, as though you are surprised your child might be tempted toward sin, or that you find your own sinful inclinations somehow less deserving of God’s judgment. Your child’s point of temptation doesn’t mean that your entire relationship with him or her should be defined by that. We don’t affirm what the Bible says is wrong simply because someone we love is drawn toward it, whether that’s “straight” fornication or gay relationships. At the same time, that doesn’t mean your entire relationship is now to become a sparring match over Romans 1. Ironically, those who cut off all relationship with a gay child buy into the narrative of the Sexual Revolutionaries, that every aspect of one’s identity is defined by sexual orientation and activity. As a Christian, you believe this person is made in the image of God, and thus worthy of love, regardless of how far away from God, or from you. First of all, consider what your child is telling you. He or she could be saying that this is an identity, from which they refuse to repent. That will require a different sort of response than if the child is saying, “This is how I feel, so what do I do?” This will change the way you respond, but what doesn’t change is your love and care for this child. Don’t panic and don’t reject them. Say explicitly that you love that child, no matter what, and mean it. Your relationship wasn’t formed by the child’s performance, and that won’t start now. If your loved one is a Christian, spend time over the years discipling him or her about what following Christ looks like. Jesus isn’t shocked by his or her temptations, and will not leave him or her alone to fight them. The path toward chastity and fidelity to Christ is a difficult one, and your child or grandchild will need you and the church and the great cloud of witnesses to cheer him or her on, as they walk a path that can be lonely in a world that too often defines sex and sexuality as ultimate in life. If your loved one isn’t a Christian, express your love, keep the relationship going, and be a gracious gospel witness. God never promises us that our children or grandchildren will all walk the way of Christ. Every wandering son or daughter needs to know that if the moment of crisis comes in his or her life, there’s a house waiting with a fatted-calf party ready to go, welcoming the wanderer home. One of the reasons this is so hard for some parents and grandparents is because somehow we assume this issue to be merely a “culture war” issue, and not a gospel issue. As such, parents are often perplexed as to how to deal with this in their families because they think this is about them. They wonder if others will judge them, as though they did something to “cause” this. That’s ridiculous, and it leads people ultimately either to reject biblical teaching to keep their kids or reject their kids (and their gospel witness to them) for the sake of appearing to keep the biblical teaching. At the root of all of that is pride, and I don’t mean that in the sense of “gay pride” but in the sense of carnal self-seeking. That’s a temptation for all parents, not just for those of gay children. We’re tempted to see our children as reflections of ourselves, and we’re tempted then to keep up our image. Crucify that temptation. God calls us to holiness, and to encourage one another to holiness. The Bible is clear that this means fleeing from sexual immorality, and that includes same-sex sexual activity (1 Cor. 6). God also calls parents to love their children. Be clear about your convictions, and at the same time don’t exile your child from your life. If we sacrifice grace for truth or truth for grace, we’re sub-Christian. www.russellmoore.com . Russell Moore is president of The Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission.

How do you beat porn addiction? For the man or woman who has been fighting this battle for the long time, often its seems like there’s no hope in sight. When we want to change, what practical defenses can be put in place that make for lasting change? Bob Reehm, author of The War Within , presents seven key tactics for maintaining sexual purity. Bob’s approach is both unique and refreshing because he weaves together his knowledge of Scripture with his experience in Naval warfare, painting a vivid picture of the spiritual battle behind sexual sin. Tactic #1: Scripture Memory – Bob writes, “A ship in the water is a good thing. Water in the ship is a bad thing. A Christian in the world is a good thing. The world in the Christian or a worldly Christian is a bad thing.” The question is: How do we keep water out of the boat? We need to utilize the weapons God has given us, and the primary weapon we have is His Word. Tactic #2: Armed with His Promises – Knowing God’s Word, we also need to apply it and meditate upon it. In times of temptation, in times of failure, and in all the ups and downs of life, we must have on the armor of God’s promises to fortify our hearts and minds. Just like a warship’s steel exterior, we must arm ourselves with His great promises, putting our trust in them, not in our feelings. Tactic #3: Reckoning Ourselves Dead to Sin – The Bible says that those who have the Spirit of Christ in them are united to Christ in his death and resurrection. This means we are currently “dead to sin.” What we must do is reckon or count this to be true. Like a warship wrapped in electromagnetic coils to ward off magnetic mines, when we wrap ourselves in Jesus Christ, we can ward off temptation. Tactic #4: Warfare Prayer – When an airplane attacks a ship on the open sea, the ship cannot outrun the plane. It must stand and fight. When Satan attacks with tempting thoughts, we cannot outrun him, but we can outgun him. Like Jesus in the wilderness, we need to have Scripture in our hearts and minds, ready to speak aloud when Satan whispers deceiving thoughts. Tactic #5: Retreat – When tempting situations present themselves, rather than remaining and letting ourselves be entertained by the idea of sin, God commands us to flee. When a ship is in range of an enemy’s guns, and there is no way to counterattack, the best thing to do is get out of range. Tactic #6: Cast Your Cares on God – When a submarine wants to attack a warship, it can hide beneath the “thermal layer” under the water. Similarly, often hidden motives and hurts in our hearts move us to act out in sinful ways. We turn to sin as an escape. Instead, we need to make God our refuge, learning the art of crying out to Him in times of frustration, exhaustion, and pain. Tactic #7: Community – No one goes to war alone. When the enemy attacks we need comrades to help us fight well. When it comes to fighting temptation and sin, we need to have fellow Christians around us, challenging us to holiness. www.covenanteyes.com . Used by permission of Luke Gilkerson.

Guest Author: Dr. Faydra Shapiro Introductions are funny things – sometimes it’s what is unsaid, what is assumed, that can tell you the most. Several years ago I gave a talk at a church in North America about Israel and Jewish-Christian relations. The listeners were very encouraging and as the talk drew to a close I felt I had really done a superb job of teaching and inspiring the audience. Until the moment when one elderly gentleman stood up to ask me a question. He said: “Thank you very much, Dr. Shapiro. That was a great talk. But one thing you didn’t really speak about was the role of your faith in Jesus Christ”. “Oh, dear”, I thought, my heart sinking. Clearly I had done a brilliant job, but I had missed an essential point. Since that day I take the time to state it plainly and for the record: I am a Jew. Admittedly a Jew with an out-of-the-ordinary interest in Christianity and the New Testament, but still, simply, an “Orthodox” Jew. That doesn’t necessarily matter much, but it’s always useful to know where a person is coming from. Today I want to discuss an issue that comes up often in my conversations with Christian – almost always evangelical – friends and students. This is the matter of “having a relationship with God”, and the belief that this is one of the benefits of the Jesus path. While I do recognize that the whole rhetoric of “relationship not religion” is a product of 1970s popular American evangelicalism, it is an attiude that has important implications even if it might not be mobilized by many Christians. Now again, let’s pay attention to the unsaid. Having a relationship with God as opposed to what? The other (clearly undesirable) option is “religion”. So with Jesus one can ostensibly have something true and immediate – a personal relationship with God, whereas Jews only have “religion”. Let’s unpack this a little. “Relationship” is understood to refer to something intimate, experiential, mystical, personal, friendly, deep, spiritual. “Religion” is ascribed the associations of being rule-oriented, man-made, legalistic, formal, distanced and superficial. Given these resonances, clearly having a relationship is something desirable whereas religion is something to progress past. And it is not uncommon for Christian readings of the gospels to assume precisely this – that what Jesus offered people was a personal (intimate, deep) relationship with God specifically in distinction to the Jews who only offered (formal, sterile) religion. You can imagine the impact that this kind of slogan has for Christian understandings of Judaism. It’s also interesting how this emphasis resonates with the current wave of people who insist that they are “spiritual, not religious.” The fact is that Judaism takes the idea of the individual’s relationship with God very seriously. It is obvious to Jews that both fear of God and love of God are important, and that emphasizing one over the over leads to an unhealthy imbalance. But the Jewish love of God and personal relationship with Him ends up looking quite different than that of contemporary evangelical Christianity for several reasons. First, most Jews find popular evangelical lyrics and expressions like “My Saviour, my closest friend” and “Jesus take the wheel” to be far too casually intimate with the Holy One Blessed be He, to be comfortable. The concern is that this approach casts the sovereign, powerful, Master of the Universe into a being dangerously much like ourselves. Second, Jews believe that doing His will is the highest expression of love, gratitude and clinging to God. In short, good relationships are expressed in action. Because performing mitzvoth (commandments) often looks so foreign to outsiders, it is very difficult for Christians to recognize things like keeping the dietary laws or Sabbath observance for what it is supposed to be – a declaration of love for God. I believe that the ideal for both Judaism and Christianity is a balance and an integration of heart and hands, relationship and religion, informal and formal, spontaneous and fixed. Our challenge is to look for the unseen behind the slogan, and behind our assumptions – to learn to see the “spiritual” in Judaism and the role of “practice” or “holy living” in Christianity. Soon Jews around the world will be marking the holiest day of the year – yom kippur (the Day of Atonement). It is a powerful day, dedicated to intensive prayer and fasting, with some of the most profound and moving liturgy of the Jewish tradition. Several times on that awesome day we will describe our relationship to God with these words: For we are your people, and you are our God. We are your children, and you are our Father. We are your servants, and you are our Lord. We are your community, and you are our Portion. We are your heritage, and you are our Lot. We are your flock, and you are our Shepherd. We are your vineyard, and you are our Keeper. We are your work, and you are our Maker. We are your companions, and you are our Beloved. We are your treasure, and you are our Friend. We are your people, and you are our King. We are your betrothed, and you are our Betrothed. From www.eteacherbiblical.com

Why do kids lie? They start early. It’s hard to trust again after a child has started habitually lying. How can you be sure he won’t lie again? How do you break him of the habit? Because once he starts, it’ll only get worse. If you’ve got a child who’s started lying, here are some things you may want to know. Kids lie for two basic reasons. One is for wish fulfillment . Some kids will come home and tell you they scored three goals in soccer…and then you find out they didn’t play at all. The second is out of fear . “Did you break that vase?” you demand. “No, I didn’t do it! Little Joey did it!” your seven-year-old claims. Most children lie out of fear. in order for there to be a relationship between two human beings, it must be based on trust otherwise the lying will become a mountain and get between them. So if your child lies to you, he needs to be caught in that lie and told that lying is not acceptable. There also needs to be a second consequence for lying. Let’s say that, a couple days later, your child says something like, “Can I go next door and play with Ronnie?” Your answer needs to be a matter-of-fact “No.” “Buy why?” your child asks. “You always let me go.” Now’s the teachable moment. “Honey, I don’t have any assurance that you’re going to be where you said you’ll be. Remember Wednesday night, when you told me you were going to be at Susan’s—and you weren’t?” Do you beat the kid over the head with the lie? No. Don’t drag it out long term. But saying something like that two or three times makes a memorable impression on a child that lying isn’t what you do. It doesn’t gain you anything, and it breaks down trust between the two of you. Children need to see and feel that immediate result. Remember the age old admonition: “You won’t get in trouble if you tell me the truth.” That needs to be true of your family. If your child tells the truth she can know that you’re unhappy, but she should not be punished for telling the truth. In those situations, you’ll need to think carefully before you open your mouth. How you respond to such a situation directly relates to how comfortable your child is in telling you the truth. Kids can be as dumb as mud and will do stupid things, but if they own up to them and say they’re sorry, they need to know that life will go on and you won’t beat them over the head for years for their mistake. Lastly, parents too have to be careful about their own lies; even those pesky little white lies are still lies. If you say to your child, “If someone from work calls, I’m not here,” and it’s not the truth, your child is smart enough to know it. And then your kid thinks, If it’s okay for you to lie, it’s okay for me to lie. Don’t forget, if you value honesty, you must also model it for your children. And that goes for any bit of character you’d like to see develop in your child For more on raising kids, Have a New Kid by Friday is a valuable resource! Purchase Have a New Kid by Friday HERE . – See more at: www.birthorderguy.com/parenting/liar-liar-pants-on-fire/

Share 0 “As you come to Him, the living Stone – rejected by men but chosen by God and precious to Him – you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house.” ~ 1 Peter 2:4-5a Part of my roots are in the Charismatic movement. In that experience, I was repeatedly encouraged to seek God for a “visitation” from heaven. As a result, I harbored the illusion that if God visited our church, He was pleased with it. I later discovered that God is not looking for a place to visit. He is looking for a place to dwell. The pages of history are littered with the sobering fact that God is no longer present in the places He once visited. Go to the landmarks of past revivals, and you’ll quickly discover that the crowds have diminished. The joy is gone. The life has evaporated. In many cases, those places are but hollow shells today. Why does the Lord leave? For me the intriguing question is: Why does the Lord leave? The answer is telling: Because He was not completely welcomed. He was allowed to visit, but He was not permitted to be head. That is, He was not granted the right to make the decisions. Visitations bless us for a short season. But a dwelling place for God is something for His interest and His desire. Blessing is merely a byproduct. It’s not the prime product. Contemplate this thought: If God “visits” a church, it betrays the fact that it doesn’t belong to Him. A homeowner doesn’t visit his own home. He lives in it. In a divine visitation, God will bless His people. But He will eventually move on and search for a home that He can call His own. Thus if the headship of Jesus Christ is not fully yielded to in a given place, the best the Lord can do is visit. He cannot take up residency. Our Lord is in a quest for a place to lay His head, a place where His headship is operative, a place where He does what He wishes, a place where He can feel comfortable and find rest. This is the indelible mark that a particular church is in fact God’s house. Anything else is but a layover for Him. Like any homeowner, God builds His house in His own way. If the home is His, He arranges the furniture the way He wishes, for He is the master of His own home. The burning intent of your God is that all of His living stones be built together with other living stones to form His house In this connection, I want you to imagine countless living stones scattered all over the earth. I want you to see innumerable living stones living their own individual Christian lives. I want you to see scores of living stones who love God, but who are isolated and independent of other living stones. Many attend religious services, but there is little to no “building together” among the members. That is precisely the situation we find ourselves in today. And what is the net effect? God is still homeless. The burning intent of your God is that all of His living stones be built together with other living stones to form His house. Not for themselves, but for their Lord. To be the house of God, by God, and for God. “Unless the Lord builds the house, its builders labor in vain.” (Psalm 127:1) “From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.” (Ephesians 4:16) Jesus Christ did not die and rise again just to forgive you of your sins. He died in order that His Father could obtain a home. The Lord saved you and me for this high and holy purpose. Without people who are being assembled together, God is a wandering, homeless God. And we are wandering, homeless Christians. Your Lord wishes to build Himself into a people, and He wishes to build a people into Himself. He is after a building, not a rock quarry. He wants a house, not a heap of stones nor a group of scattered rocks. The Lord Jesus Christ is looking for willing vessels who will abandon their Western-style individualism and live a shared life with others under His exclusive headship. This is our high calling. This Week Make a home for the Lord in your life. Each day, give Him complete headship to arrange your life as He wishes. Then begin to connect with other “living stones” by building relationships with fully-committed believers who are interested in fulfilling His eternal purpose. Excerpted from From Eternity to Here © 2009 Frank Viola (David C. Cook). Originally published in Life Today with James Robison, December 2009.

The story of the Samaritan woman is one of the most beloved stories ever told by the gospel writers. The story is read and heard dozens of times throughout the life of almost every Christ-follower. Yet some key questions in the story seem to remain unanswered. Why does John mention to the reader that the conversation takes place in the presence of the silent witness – the bones of Joseph? (Every Israelite knew that the bones of Joseph were buried in the plot of land that Jacob gave to Joseph (John 4:5; Josh.24:32)). Is it because the woman suffered much in her life, and just as with Joseph, her suffering will lead to the salvation of her people? Why did the Samaritan woman (if she really was a woman of ill repute, as traditional interpretation has it) command such a sway over the religious Samaritan society, that upon hearing her the villagers drop what they are doing and immediately come to meet a young Jew that is passing through Samaria at her request? These are not the only issues that seem to seriously question the traditional reading of the Samaritan woman. There are many others. One of the key problems that we face today is that we do not understand the ancient inter-Israelite polemic, as did John and his readers. They knew that Samaritans (as oppose to Samarians) believed themselves to be the faithful remnant of Israel, preserving the original Mosaic and Abrahamic traditions. They were not Samarians inhabitants of Samaria who once offered to help rebuild the Jerusalem Temple (Ezra 4:1-3). They were the Samaritans, the Guardians of Torah. They could not possibly come to help the returned Judean exiles, whom they considered straying away from the original Israelite religion and bringing back to Israel their dangerous Babylonian practices. The difference between Samarians and Samaritans would be easily discernible if you had the basics of Biblical Hebrew. Come join us on this exciting journey. To explore, go to our website. Yours, Dr. Eli Lizorkin-Eyzenberg Dr.eli@eTeachergroup.com