This past week, I listened to two teachings by John Piper on worship. As usual, they were mind-blowing and spirit-stirring.

The first was entitled The God of Worship.

The second was entitled The Heart of Worship.

He looks at some texts you would not expect, and some you would expect. Yet, the impact they had on me was astounding. So click on the links above and I hope you become as stirred as I was.

Over at InternetMonk, there is quite an interesting guest post entitled, Why I Don’t Participate In The ‘Christmas Wars’. Or, at least it was interesting to me. The point of the article is to show that the Christmas season is really not that bad, even with the reality of its consumer commercialisation focus within the US (and now even other countries of the world). Continue reading

December 25th! A wonderful day, at least in the west. Well, it’s kind of taken on quite a different focus with the rise of extreme commercialisation of the date. But, as Christians (at least in the western hemisphere), we celebrate this day as the date when the Word-became-flesh. Or more simply, this is the day we celebrate Jesus’ Birthday. Continue reading

When we hear the word ‘Immanuel’, we probably are quick to think of two words – Jesus and Christmas. It is at Christmas time, this time of year, that we celebrate Immanuel, that is, ‘God with us’ in the incarnation of the Son of God. We turn to both Isaiah 7:14 and Matthew 1:23 and find two of the most known passages in all of Scripture:

Behold, the virgin shall be with child and shall bear a son, and they shall call His name Immanuel. Continue reading