Things of Note: January 12-18

Another week, another look back on things that I heard, saw, or read.

• I am a massive Chris Stapleton fan, even before he sang the best version of the National Anthem at Super Bowl LVII. It's hard for me to imagine his songs sounding even better than they do, but this version of "Tennessee Whiskey" was pretty incredible. Well done, Kubla!

• Like I mentioned last week, I've set a reading goal for this year: 12 books in 2026. I currently have four books in my reading stack and wanted to share some particularly inspiring quotes from them.

Prayer is both conversation and encounter with God...We must know the awe of praising his glory, the intimacy of finding his grace, and the struggle of asking his help, all of which can lead us to know the spiritual reality of his presence. (Tim Keller, Prayer: Experiencing Awe and Intimacy with God, p. 5)

In ministry, we are reading two "texts" simultaneously, the story of Scripture and the story of the person we serve. In ministry, we must always have one eye on the biblical text and one eye on the individual. Or better, our gaze constantly shifts between the two. Reading the Bible without reading the person is a recipe for irrelevance in ministry. Reading the person without reading the Bible is a recipe for ministry lacking the life-changing power of the Spirit working through his Word. (Michael R. Emlet, CrossTalk: Where Life and Scripture Meet, p. 84)

[Singleness] is almost always defined in the negative, as the absence of something. It's the state of not being married. Is the absence of a significant other. This defining by negation reinforces the idea that there is nothing intrinsically good about singleness; it is merely the situation of lacking what is intrinsically good in marriage. (Sam Allberry, Seven Myths About Singleness, p. 12)

We need to rediscover a biblical category for intimacy that has been neglected in our cultural context and sadly even in many of our churches—friendship. (Allberry, p. 50)

We were eighteen and had begun to love life and the world; and we had to shoot it to pieces. The first bomb, the first explosion, burst in our hearts. We are cut off from activity, from striving, from progress. We believe in such things no longer, we believe in the war. (Erich Maria Remarque, All Quiet on the Western Front, Chapter 5, pg. 88

I'll try and post more quotations of books as I read them this year!

• A friend of mine sent this in a group chat (Thanks, Lydia!), and I can't stop listening to it! Filing this one away to lead in church one day.

• In closing, here is an excellently produced video that reframes "productivity" through a Biblical lens. Well worth the 20ish minutes to watch.

...I am not my own, but belong—body and soul, in life and in death— to my faithful Savior, Jesus Christ. (Heidelberg, Lord's Day 1)

Until next week!