Many of you may have already seen this video.  (If you have, it's worth-a-watch again.)  It deals with issues like community and relationships, the implications and ethics of technology, and more.  Bottom line?  It's a video that should provoke some thought - whether you ultimately agree with all that it says (or how it's said) or not.

Creator God, protect us - Your creations - from allowing our creations to become lords of us.

I'm a huge fan of reading the Bible closely.  This is why I talk about the habit of "observation" - and practice it whenever I can - in Brookside Institute classes.  (The place we spend the most intentional time devoted to this is our class called "Bible Basics: An Important Class about God's Word.")

After all, the question we never get away from when reading God's Word is this: "What does God’s Word actually say?"  As we read God's Word, we need to look at what’s actually there.  Then look again.  Look, look, look.  See what those in the passage saw.  Hear what those being addressed heard.  Don’t feel an obligation to rush through God’s Word.  Walk slowly and pay careful attention to the surroundings.

All of this is why I'm excited to introduce you to a recent undertaking by John Piper - his "Look at the Book" series of short videos where he practices careful observation of God's Word to mine its treasures.  And the ultimate goal?  (I love this.)  "...to help you read God's Word for yourself."  

Here's a closer look at "Look at the Book":

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 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: 

By design, the Brookside Institute is a classroom environment.  Our focus is on equipping adults with knowledge, values, and skills that they can take and apply in places outside of our classroom environment.  And, to be honest, our classes can tilt towards the academic.  We want to wrestle with the big questions people are asking.  We want to introduce theory that should inform practice.

In my opinion, an equipping, academically-oriented classroom environment plays an important role in the life of a healthy, growing church.  But we also need to be aware of dangers that can go along with this sort of environment.  A few weeks ago I talked about core values we want to be leaning into every way we can. In this post, we need to talk about "academic vices" - things that can creep into this sort of environment and destroy what we're trying to do - so together we can guard against them in every way we can.

Here are four "academic vices" we need to guard against together: