[After a month-long sabbatical from blogging, the PBC blog returns today and will return to its regular schedule next week with the Tolle Lege book feature every other Friday. Thanks for your patience as I worked on other vital areas at PBC. I am happy to return to the familiar turf of writing! I will feature Reformation books over the next three Fridays in honor of Reformation month--Pastor Jeff].

[NOTE: Below is the blog post I mentioned yesterday from the PBC pulpit written by Tom and Diane Schreiner's son, Patrick. It shows remarkabe, grace-centered thinking during a dark providence for the Schreiner family. Please continue to pray for Diane's recovery and for grace for this dear family. I will keep you abreast of Diane's condition in the days ahead.

By Tony Reinke

[Note: This post was originally published on Desiring God's blog--CJR]

Puritan writers like John Owen are well-known for teaching Christians to pursue holiness and kill sin. This is helpful, but Puritans like Owen also recognized that this can also lead to a serious misunderstanding on the part of Christians. In the pursuit of holiness, Christians are tempted to dwell too much on their own sins and forget the kindness of their Heavenly Father.

[Note: Unless otherwise noted, the page numbers following the quotes in this article are taken from Thabiti Anyabwile’s book What is a Healthy Church Member?]

Note: The following review is from my dear friend Tom Ascol, head of Founders Ministries. It is a book all we who cherish Reformed Theology desperately need to read and serves as a much-needed reminder that the doctrines we believer are the doctrines of "grace." If our embrace of the doctrines of grace push us in the direction of arrogance, we have not yet understood God's grace accurately.

Summer with its easier pace of life and vacations from work makes prime time for reading. Below is the annual reading lists that we at the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood publish. This list recommends       books of specific interest to men and women. Some of them are related to theology and Bible, others are a bit lighter in nature, but all commendable. Some of them are freshly minted off the press, others are a few years old. Choose one that draws your interest and practice loving God with all your mind this summer!

 [Note: I offer the following post as a tribute to my own father on Father's Day. Happy Father's Day to the dads of PBC! --Pastor Jeff-

[NOTE: A group of SBC leaders this week released a statement touting what they believe is "the traditional Southern Baptist view" of salvation, which is nothing less than an attack on the doctrines of God's salvation by sovereign grace. The statement is disconcerting in that it seems to uphold semi-Pelagianism, an approach to salvation that was condemned as heresy by a church council in the year 418.

[NOTE: Below is an excellent article by Justin Taylor on accountabilities and accountability groups with especially valuable thoughts by R.C. Sproul, Jr.--Pastor Jeff]

By Justin Taylor

[NOTE: Following is a post by Mary Kassian of CBMW/Southern Seminary on the current gender madness in Sweden which I first wrote on here a few months back. It is a sad tribute to the drift of our culture as it grows more and more captive to the prince of darkness. Mary Kassian edits an excellent website on biblical womanhood, called "Girls Gone Wise": www.girlsgonewise.com.]

By Mary Kassian

All your Friends are Hens

In a Baptist church with its commitment to believers-only membership, perhaps it should go without saying that a healthy church member is one who is really and truly a follower of Christ whose heart has been changed by the Spirit of God. In the modern-day evangelical church culture, however, this is not necessarily a fact that may be assumed.   

By. R. Albert Mohler Jr.

I recently watched as a young mother acted quickly and decisively to end a squabble among two preschool boys. She acted righteously and quite effectively, and then she turned to her two charges and set down the law: “It is never right to fight.”

Sorry, Mom, I understand what you were trying to do, but that moral instruction will not serve those boys well as they grow into maturity. Their challenge will be to learn when it is right to fight, and how, as the Bible commands, to fight the good fight of faith.

There is a notion that is very strong in most evangelical churches today that serious study of theology and the Bible are best left to the seminary professors and the “religious professionals.” Nothing could be further from the truth. Because, whether you know it or not, you are a theologian. The question is, are you a good theologian? I am convinced that every Christian can and should become an able theologian and scholar of God’s Word, but it takes discipline, commitment and hard work. It is, however, well worth the effort!

Both my ordaining council and numerous seminary professors told me it would happen, but I did not believe them. It would not happen to me. After all, I believe the five points of Calvinism, the five solas of the Reformation, hold to the complentary nature of the relationship between husband and wife and the absolute inerrancy, sufficiency and authority of Scripture.

May it please God to edify our members this weekend as believers across the globe celebrate the good news of Good Friday and Easter Sunday. We hope you will join us for our Good Friday service this evening at 6 p.m. during which we will celebrate our Lord's death and resurrection through the Lord's Supper. Christ the Lord is risen! Alelujah!

Who has believed what he has heard from us?And to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed?

What is the Bible and how should we interpret it? What determines the meaning of the text and can it have more than one meaning? Is the Bible all about Jesus and do the commands of God all apply to believers today? How did we get the books of the Bible?

[Note:  The Following post is from the Desiring God Blog and was written by Matt Reagan. It is an excellent reflection on sports and Christianity, two subjects near and dear to many in the body at PBC. I think you will find it helpful.--Jeff]

By MATT REAGAN

Are athletic achievement and fierce competition sheer madness for the Christian?

Back from a week at the beach rested, rejuvenated and ready to return to the front lines of war! (Remember, that’s my operative analogy for the Christian life and ministry in the local church) Today, we return to the second in a 10-part series answering the question “What is a healthy church member?” I am basing this series on the excellent book by Thabiti Anyabwile by the same title.

There are more books presently available on the subject of evangelism than at perhaps any time in the history of the church but virtually none that provide a theologically sound approach to dealing with "anxious souls concerning the way of salvation."

[NOTE: Below is an excellent summary on the daily life in the home of the great reformer Martin Luther. It was written by Justin Taylor and appears on his blog today. The Luthers were an excellent model of the Christ-saturated home. May it please God to raise up more hospitable, godly homes in the mold of Martin and Katie Luther! --CJR]

Steve Zollos's new book, Time for the Talk: Leading Your Son into True Manhood (Shepherd's Press), is a very helpful and unique resource for those of us who are raising sons. There are many whom this describes among our congregation at PBC.

From the preface to dads of young boys:

An excellent new theological magazine, Credo, made its debut in December, edited by my dear friends at Southern Seminary. I will be contributing historical and theological articles every other month and my article on John Calvin and evangelism (really, it's just a preview of my forthcoming book with Michael Haykin).

[Editor's note: Does God care if Tim Tebow wins? Those of us who prize God's sovereignty should have a very different answer to that question than the secular media. My friend and former SBTS colleague Owen Strachan gives an excellent answer to that question below. Follow the link to read the entire artice. Tolle Lege will move to a bi-weekly Friday schedule.--CJR]

Does God Care if Tim Tebow Wins?

By Owen Strachan

Tim Tebow succeeds on the football field because of elves.

NOTE: Below is the first part of the sermon I preached on Sunday night in which I set forth my resolution for myself and the body at PBC for 2012. I encourage every member to access the audio and listen to this vital message. As I told the body, this resolution has been mine each year for the past 12 years or so. Tomorrow, I will post the application section which, as I made clear to those in attendance, was borrowed largely from John Piper's monumental book Don't Waste Your Life.--CJR  

[Editor's note: Below is the Christmas e-mail I sent to the body yesterday. Please note that since I am traveling next week, I will not resume blogging again until Jan. 1 or 2. Tolle Lege will return on Jan. 6. Please pray for my family as we travel to Georgia to visit family. May God be glorified in your homes as you meditate upon the Incarnation during this Advent season.--CJR]

For those so interested, I have written a new post on CBMW's Gender Blog this morning on a disturbing development in Sweden: the push for genderless schools. Government-supported schools there are being encouraged to create a gender-free atmosphere in a sinful denial of God's truth that echo the words of the serpent in Eden: "Has God really said?" What is happening in Sweden is sad beyond belief.

The December edition of Focus on the Family’s Citizen magazine reports on a troubling development in the realm of video games: a new Star Wars game will include gay characters after succumbing to pressure from homosexual advocates. So let parents pay close attention to what online games their children are playing and what they are buying them for Christmas. A game that seems innocuous and safe may in fact be a Trojan horse. Below is the news brief from Citizen in its entirety:

Do the doctrines of grace turn God into a moral monster? Unfortunately many in the church and outside think it does. Follow the links below to read Michael Horton's excellent response to this charge. The article is taken from Justin Taylor's blog:

At 500, John Calvin has not aged well in the popular modern mind. Stefan Zweig, an Austrian writer, in the late-1930s said Calvin was interchangeable with Adolph Hitler.

The Southern Poverty Law Center wants our elementary school students to think about gender roles and the liberal civil rights group has gone so far as to develop a curriculum to facilitate such thinking. Titled “Gender Doesn’t Limit You,” the lessons are designed to flatten gender distinctions and teach children that, at the end of the day, boys are girls are exactly alike.