For those of you who follow this site a bit more closely, you've likely noticed I've not been posting much in April.  The reasons?  There's about 13 of them, actually, and they're pictured above - the pastors I had the privilege of being with again as part of the Hope Center Pastor Training School in Serenje, Zambia.  (Don't worry, I'm hoping to pick up my blogging in early May!)

This year at the Hope Center Pastor Training School, we walked through (1) the book of 1 Corinthians, (2) a class on the Theology of the Holy Spirit, and (3) a class on Discipleship in the Book of 1 Peter.  These men are eager learners, faithful servants, and partners in the gospel.  Their work inspires me and challenges me, and continually reminds me of the big, global God we serve together.  Pray that God continues to work in these men and through their local churches, for the good of His church in Zambia.

Interested in finding out a bit more about what the Brookside Institute (and Brookside Church) is doing in Zambia?  Follow any of the trails below:

• A short video explaining Pastor Training in Zambia

• Why I Train Pastors in Zambia

• An Overview of What Brookside is Doing in Zambia

Here's a sampling of some of the things I've been reading and reviewing this week.  The hope is that these bite-sized sections of books, articles, blog posts, etc will stand on their own and be beneficial (or at least thought-provoking!) in-and-of-themselves.  But I also hope that some of you will like these excerpts enough that they pull you into the larger work from which they've been taken.

Let's start sampling: 

I love this quote from p. 67 of N.T. Wright's Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church - it captures the significance of Christ's resurrection, articulating it as THE hinge that ushers in God's new creation (cf. 2 Corinthians 5:17):