Category: Mission - The Brookside Institute

The Brookside Institute

How Should You Approach God's Word? Here's One Great Example.

4/9/2019

Not too long ago I ran across a 10 min video that Justin Taylor posted on The Gospel Coalition, capturing how a tribe in Indonesia responded when they received copies of the New Testament in their own language. Because I wanted to keep this video easily accessible for myself, and because of how this video reinforces the value of biblical literacy (something the Brookside Institute is all about), I wanted to post it here as well.

In John 5:39 Jesus teaches that the Scriptures testify about Him. Isaiah 55:10-11 tells us that God's Word accomplishes His purposes as it goes out. Since that's the case, we should celebrate and support every example of God's Word being made accessible to more and more people.

As the Kimyal Tribe continues to engage God's Word, may it point them more and more to the greatness of Jesus, and may God accomplish mighty things through His Word among them!

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My 2018 Top 5 "Top Reading Lists of 2018"

12/24/2018

Looking for some of the best biblical and theological books to read in 2019? Below I've collected and listed five "sources" that are worth listening to for some worthwhile reads.

My hope is that as you scan these lists, you'll find at least 2-3 books that strike your interest enough for you to pick up the book and dig in.

Click on either the image or the title below and you'll be taken directly to a page where you can see which books are on that particular list.

My Top 5 Reading Lists of 2018

Christianity Today's 2019 Book Awards

The Gospel Coalition: 2018 TGC Book Awards

Verge Network - Top Books of 2018

Sam Storms - Top 10 Books of 2018

Tim Challies - The Collected Best Christian Books of 2018

Interested in more?

Below you'll find a few other links to related posts. Happy reading!

Making a Case for Jesus' Resurrection

12/15/2018

It's no exaggeration to say that Christianity stands or falls on Jesus' resurrection. If Jesus wasn't raised bodily from the dead, our faith is "useless" and "futile" (see 1 Corinthians 15:14 and 15:17-19). But if Jesus HAS been raised bodily from the dead...well, we'd better pay attention to Him. The Christian faith has meaning, our future has hope, and our mission matters.

So why is it credible to believe in Jesus' resurrection? Or even beyond that, why does it make the best sense of the evidence we have to believe that Jesus rose from the dead? Here are four lines of evidence that - when put together - build a strong case for the reliability of Jesus' resurrection.

Happy Reformation Day 2018!

10/31/2018

This posted in adapted from an earlier post on this site, first composed on October 31, 2014.

Tonight is Halloween. A couple of my kids will likely be going door-to-door getting candy, and we'll probably be handing out candy to neighborhood kids from our door as well. But October 31 is significant for more reasons than just this. October 31 is also "Reformation Day" - the day in 1517 when a monk named Martin Luther nailed 95 Theses to a church door in Germany and sparked what we now call the Protestant Reformation. (For a recommended introduction to Luther's 95 Theses, check out this book.)

Here's what Philip Schaff, a noted church historian, says about the significance of the Reformation:

“The Reformation of the sixteenth century is, next to the introduction of Christianity, the greatest event in history. It marks the end of the Middle Ages and the beginning of modern times. Starting from religion, it gave, directly or indirectly, a mighty impulse to every forward movement, and made Protestantism the chief propelling force in the history of modern civilization.”

- Philip Schaff, History of the Christian Church, Vol. VII: Modern Christianity—The German Reformation [1910; repr., Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1980]

If your'e looking to brush up a bit on Reformation history, check out this post from Ligonier Ministries. This post shares a bit more about the history of the Reformation and key players in it. I encourage you to take a few minutes on this Reformation Day of 2018 and check it out.

Here's the post: "The Reformation and the Men Behind It" by Stephen Lawson

Please note the usual disclaimer, that my recommendation of this article is not necessarily an endorsement of everything else on the site where this was posted. As always, read both discerningly and graciously, and with the Bible as your final authority.

Retiring a Jersey: Moralistic Therapeutic Deism and the Gospel

8/1/2017

If you ever check out the footer of this site, where we highlight the top 5 posts of the previous month, you'll have seen "What is Moralistic Therapeutic Deism? And How Does it Stack Up against Biblical Christianity?" has been on a #1 streak for a while (a long while!). And it's understandable why.

Moralistic Therapeutic Deism (MTD) is often called the "default religion" of many Americans - whether they consciously articulate it or not. And MTD is definitely NOT a direct overlap of biblical Christianity. To understand the "background noise" that informs the perspective of many Americans - even American Christians - one needs to understand MTD.

If you've not checked out the post, you can do so here.

So as a nod to the popularity of this post, I'm officially going to "retire the jersey." I'll leave the post just as it is on the site and will include it in the "retired jersey" category of this site's "Library" page. However, moving forward I'll no longer include it in numbers 1-5 of each month's top posts (even though it continues to rank highly among the website "hits" for individual posts), thus allowing room for other posts.

Interested in other posts that have gotten a lot of traffic on this site recently? Click here to check 'em out!

Interested in seeing all of the "retired jersey" posts up to this point? Here they are:

It's Not Too Late! A Review of the Top 5 Blog Posts Each Month, for the Last 6 Months

7/22/2017

Based on the number of "hits" each month, here are the top 5 posts here on the Brookside Institute blog for the last six months - January 2017 through June 2017. Take a minute to scroll through the list below and either catch up on things you may have missed or revisit things that were especially helpful.

Secularism, Pluralism, "Indifferentism" and Catechesis

5/13/2017

Every now and then I try to take some time and reflect on why the intentional teaching ministry of the church remains important. Whatever shape it takes, why is equipping and a teaching in the church, for the church, and by the church valuable?

At least one reason is the growth of secularism, pluralism, and "indifferentism" in America. Very simply stated, secularism is a worldview that pushes God to the margins. It's fine to believe in God on your own, the secularist may say, just don't bring any religious ideas or reasoning into the public square. Pluralism flows out of the reality that we are surrounded by people who believe very different things than than us - and it often goes a step further to say the no one religion can be exclusively true. "Indifferentism" (this is my term, I think) tries to explain the religious apathy of the "nones" and "dones" - those who adhere to no single religious expression (the "nones") or those who have "tried out" some religion and - for whatever reason - didn't stick with it.

So what does all this have to do with catechesis - an intentional and systematic approach to teaching in the local church? Here's what:

Ravi Zacharias Reinforces the Value of Equipping the Church

8/30/2016

I recently ran across a 2009 article where Christian apologist, speaker and author Ravi Zacharias talks about "Defending Christianity in a Secular Culture." The whole thing is good, and I encourage you to read it.

In a few places throughout the article, Zacharias draws attention to the value of equipping the church, in the face of a secular culture that is increasingly hostile or indifferent towards Christianity. Below are some short quotes from the article where we see this:

How Can I Subscribe to the Brookside Institute Blog?

8/25/2016

(This is an updated version of a post I initially composed on July 22, 2014.)

I've recently gotten a few questions from people asking very specifically how they can get emails with updated posts from the Brookside Institute blog, without having to remember to check in periodically on their own. They want to stay in the loop, but they won't always remember to go looking for new content. And when they do remember, they may not be near a computer or it may not be a convenient time.

I love this question. I love it that people want to stay in the loop, and that we're providing valuable enough content that people want to stay engaged.

Here's how I respond to this question:

There's no way that I know of to get emails specifically from the Brookside Institute, providing updated content as new posts are published. (If I'm missing something on this, someone please let me know!) However that doesn't mean there's no way to conveniently stay in the loop. The solution is to subscribe to something called a "feed reader" that will collect the content (the "RSS Feed") you want from sites you subscribe to. Then, you simply monitor your feed reader and can conveniently stay up to date on the content you've chosen to subscribe to.

Below I've included some detailed steps on how to subscribe to an RSS Feed and have it collected into a feed reader. Before I get into that, though, let me briefly share WHAT an RSS Feed is and WHY subscribing to the RSS Feed can be helpful.

A Plug for Christian Education from Across the Ocean

5/5/2016

For much of the second half of April, I was helping train pastors in Zambia as part of the Hope Center Pastor Training School near Serenje. While I was there and teaching through "1-2 Timothy & Titus, with Special Emphasis on the Doctrine of the Church," the topic of teaching and preaching came up. After all, it's tough to work through these books of the New Testament and NOT talk about these things!

I love how the pastors - on their own - brought up the importance of teaching and educational environments, in addition to and alongside the important role preaching plays in the life of a church. These interactions with the pastors have stayed fresh in my mind since then.