We all know that we cannot follow Jesus unless we follow him along the path of the cross. We have to die to ourselves, which dying includes denying ourselves those things which hinder us from joyful obedience and faith. When facing something that must be shed away from my life, it helps me to consider the fact that there is coming a day when I will be living without this thing anyway. This world, this age, is passing away. It will someday be gone. I, however, will be raised to live a new life in the world to come. Now, faith realizes the future (Heb. 11:1). By faith I can imagine being utterly happy in another time (very weakly, of course, since, as Lewis reminds us, our desires are too weak). Why not go ahead and start celebrating? You will leave that sin behind someday anyway; go ahead and do it now. You will leave that pleasure behind someday anyway; go ahead and leave it now. You get the idea. This is not contrary to the intent of our Creator for us to enjoy and be thankful for al...

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http://timescolumns.typepad.com/gledhill/ Even though The Episcopal Church has officially denied the faith and the Anglican tradition, the Archbishop of Canterbury still wants to keep them in the Communion in some fashion. The only way I can understand this is that AB Rowan simply agrees too much with TEC on their positions. Very sad. Dear Queen Elizabeth, please give us an ABC who holds to the Faith once received.

Go here for the news: http://cslewischatt.blogspot.com/2009/07/unpublished-cs-lewis-manuscript-found.html

Ruth Gledhill - Times Online - WBLG: Princely Bishop of Durham rides to the rescue Shared via AddThis

John R. W. Stott preached a sermon on Christian emotion in 2005. It is a good basic statement on how our feelings are to be a part of our discipleship. He quotes Bishop Moule, too! Good for him! Download the sermon from All Souls by clicking here.

I'm reading R. L. Dabney's The Practical Philosophy , which is a book on Christian ethics. The beginning chapters are very important and I cannot help but relate them to "youth ministry". His thesis is that a person's feelings play an absolutely critical role in how he lives. The feelings are the motivating part of our hearts. Unless feeling is involved in an intellectual decision, there will be no action following the decision. Indeed, without the feeling, there would be no motivation to do the thinking in the first place. Without feeling, writes Dabney, "man would be reduced to both apathy and idiocy." Here is an excellent passage: "The feelings practically make the man. Intellect is the cold, feeble magnetism which gives the ship its compass to steer by. Feeling is the motive power, throbbing within the vessel and propelling it; without which the ship, in spite of the needle pointing with its subtle intelligence to the pole, rots in the harbor a...