Podcast Pick of the Week: This conversation between an Eastern Orthodox Christian and Jordan Peterson is fascinating on a number of levels, considering the topics discussed, but mainly because it appears Peterson is trembling on the threshold of adopting some kind of Christian faith.
Kindle Deal: Depression, Anxiety, and the Christian Life: Practical Wisdom from Richard Baxter by Michael Lundy. $3.99.
Seven of the best articles I came across this week:
1. Ray Ortlund – Leaders Must Fight on Multiple Fronts. I couldn’t have asked for a better foreword to my next book. Ray’s insights here distill a vitally important principle for pastors and church leaders.
“It can be easy for us to be half-right as we contend for some aspect of the gospel. And because, at that particular point, we really are half-right, we do not see that we are also half-wrong—or, at least, incomplete. We see and rejoice in the good and true boxes we have rightly checked off. But we honestly do not perceive how many blanks we have never filled in. We can be blind to the towering beauty of fully developed, well-proportioned, mature, biblical Christianity.”
2. Leigh Stein – The Empty Religions of Instagram. “Many millennials who have turned their backs on religious tradition because it isn’t sufficiently diverse or inclusive have found alternative scripture online. Our new belief system is a blend of left-wing political orthodoxy, intersectional feminism, self-optimization, therapy, wellness, astrology and Dolly Parton.”
3. Andrew Wilson – Copycat Culture Wars. America has exported its culture wars: the tenor and temperature of its debates about gun control, race, politics, identity, cultural appropriation and so forth have gone forth and multiplied internationally, especially in English-speaking nations.
4. Dhati Lewis – 4 Unseen Ways God is Moving in North America. Sharing stories and hearing stories of how God is at work is a powerful way to connect our hearts to God and one another, to be encouraged, and to remember to hold fast to the hope we have in Christ.
5. Zeynep Tufekci – 5 Pandemic Mistakes We Keep Repeating. The problem is not that the good news isn’t being reported, or that we should throw caution to the wind just yet. It’s that neither the reporting nor the public-health messaging has reflected the truly amazing reality of these vaccines.
6. D. A. Carson – Contemporary Challenges to Inerrancy. Current objections to the biblical doctrine of inerrancy include matters of word and act, accommodation of the divine Author to the human authors, knowledge and uncertainty, and moral objections to the text of Scripture.
7. Nora Dominick – 33 WandaVision Moments vs. the Sitcoms They Reference. As a fan of both classic TV sitcoms and the Marvel superheroes, you understand why I geek out over this kind of thing.