Weekly Sampler Platter: Friday, October 24, 2014

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: 

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Timothy Larsen, "Cheerful Confidence After Christendom" at 9marks.org.  Posted October 21, 2014.

"...there are unique joys, privileges, and opportunities for serving God in each generation. We are called not to hanker after a different age, but rather to jump in with relish to following Christ at this moment. There is an old Puritan saying: 'If you would make the greatest success of your life, try to discover what God is doing in your time, and fling yourself into the accomplishment of his purpose and will.'"

Click here to see the full post from which this excerpt was taken.  Please note the usual disclaimer, that my recommendation of this post is not necessarily an endorsement of everything else on the site where this was posted.

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Larry Osborne, Sticky Teams.  Zondervan, 2010, pp. 212 (bold emphasis added):

"Be greatly encouraged.  Be filled with joy and optimism....Jesus did promise that he would build his church and that the gates of hell would not hold it back.  Don't miss something important in that promise.  The gates of hell aren't an offensive weapon.  No one picks up a gate and goes on the attack.  Gates are a last line of defense.  Jesus wasn't just saying that the church can't be destroyed.  He was saying that it won't be held back.
 
"For two thousand years, we've suffered more than our share of failed leadership, astounding cultural blind spots, nasty fights, misplaced priorities, millstone traditions, and lots of sin in the camp.  But we've not been able to kill off the church yet.  She's still [Jesus'] bride.  He's still in love with her, and he's still coming back to take her home....
 
"So hang tough, my friends.  Remember: in the end, we win." 

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Roy Peterson, "Americans and the Bible."  NAE Insight, Fall 2014.  (www.nae.net)

"For the first time, the 2014 [State of the Bible] study found the percentage of Americans considered Bible lovers equaled the percentage considered Bible skeptics. Driving this decline are America’s youngest adults. Millennials, those aged 18-29, place less value on Scripture than the majority of American adults. While 50 percent of all adults believe the Bible has too little influence in society, only 30 percent of Millennials agree. And while half of all adults believe the Bible contains everything a person needs to know to live a meaningful life, just 35 percent of Millennials express the same belief."

Click here to see the full article from which this excerpt was taken.  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.