On February 20, 2025
By Jason
In Culture, Discipleship, Theology, Wisdom
1
“…but sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts, always being ready to make a defense to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you, yet with gentleness and fear.” (1 Peter 3:15)
In the Western world today reality as we know it is being assailed, reformulated in the cauldron of human autonomy and self-expression. On the one hand man finds himself in an ineradicable condition: he exists in a world with a vehement desire for answers. He is driven by a quest for knowledge, understanding, and meaning/purpose. On the other hand this man finds himself in an equally precarious situation: he is bent on sin and transgression, or at least he is told. How will he function? What can possibly give him resolution and peace? With a restless heart fixated on some reasonable explanation, men today go searching for answers, sometimes in the discovery of the actual true truth (i.e., that which corresponds to the mind of God), other times in the discovery or fabrication of an idol (which is what all covenant-breakers in Adam do). But either way, he is always and in every way homo respondens—a man who simply responds to his divinely-created environment.
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On February 17, 2025
By Bill Smith
In Discipleship, Family and Children, Worship
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From the beginning of our history, the family has had a mission. That mission involves being fruitful, multiplying, filling the earth, and subduing every square inch of creation so that God’s kingdom will come and his will be done on earth as it is in heaven (Gen 1.26-28; Matt 6.10). That’s a rather large mission for any one of us or any one family to think about! Thankfully, God hasn’t given the entire mission to one particular household. The original family–Adam and Eve–was fruitful and multiplied so that the family became families that began to spread out throughout the earth. Some of these families were united together in their rebellion against God, while other families were united together in their loyalty to God. The rebellious families worked against God’s original purpose, and the loyal families worked for God’s purpose for them and for the entire creation. We, the church of Jesus Christ, are now the family of God made up of families who seek to fulfill God’s original purpose of fruitfulness, multiplication, filling the earth, and subduing the creation to the lordship of Jesus Christ. Your Christian family is integral to this larger mission of the church.
In order for your family to fulfill its God-given mission, the first thing that must be done is for you and your family to be subdued to the lordship of Jesus. This begins in fulfilling our mission to enter into the presence of God to hear from and speak to him. This is prayer. God’s plan is for the world to take a certain shape, to look like heaven. We won’t know what that is unless we first hear from him. This is where family worship or family prayer comes in. Family worship is time dedicated to prayer and the Scriptures in the context of daily life. It is focused and purposeful reading and meditation on Scripture and responding to God in confession, praise, thanksgiving, and supplication. One of the goals of family worship is to shape your family as a whole and each individual more into the image of Christ.
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On December 7, 2024
By Bill Smith
In Culture, Discipleship, Men
1
Dear Young Man,
I haven’t written a letter like this in a while, but having watched online interactions over the past few years, it seemed prudent to take up this format again. Generational hostilities have heated up on social media, especially coming from millennials and Gen Z, and I want to address it. (If you are not part of the social media militia, you can still read this letter with profit, but it won’t apply to you as directly). The “OK, Boomer” attitude has become a standard meme. Older generations (including Gen X, of which I am a part) are railed against for the messes they have left for the younger generations while providing them few, if any, tools with which to clean them up. Many of the accusations are legitimate. Boomers, having been raised by Silents who had to scrape by during the depression and face the harsh realities of World War 2, wanted an easier life for their children. My grandpa, a Silent who was, for all intents and purposes, my father, told me that he wouldn’t teach me to weld (he was a master welder) because he wanted me to get a college education so I wouldn’t have to work as hard as he did. The Silents gave their children everything they could, making life as easy as possible. It turned into a culture of rebellion, “free love,” Second Wave Feminism, and a general self-centeredness whose greatest aspiration was to retire at a young age to free themselves of as much responsibility as possible.
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On November 14, 2024
By Bill Smith
In Counseling/Piety, Discipleship, Theology, Wisdom
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Forgiveness and reconciliation can be a thorny issue. Many questions must be asked to determine the shape of forgiveness and reconciliation. Is sin truly involved, or is one of the people offended because of his own unrealistic expectations of the other person? That is, one person has his feelings hurt because he is overly demanding, and no one lives up to his expectations. If sin is involved, is the sin of such a nature that it can be forgiven so that the relationship can return to what it was? If one spouse speaks uncharacteristically harshly to the other, forgiveness can be granted and the sin practically forgotten. Or is the sin of such a nature that the relationship is unalterably changed even though forgiveness is granted? If a spouse is a serial adulterer/adulteress, leading to a divorce, the marriage may never go back to what it was. Is the sinning party repentant or unrepentant? What is the part restitution plays in reconciliation? What does the healing process look like after forgiveness is granted? Though we don’t need to make forgiveness more complicated than necessary, human relationships are not as simple as “do these three things and move on.” (I’ve written several articles on forgiveness at Kuyperian Commentary. You can find them here, and a series that begins here.)
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On November 7, 2024
By Bill Smith
In Counseling/Piety, Discipleship, Wisdom
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“Just tell me what to do!” Pastors and counselors sometimes hear these words from people in difficult situations. Whether they have gotten themselves into the situations through unwise decisions or suffering from someone else’s sin against them, they want answers. They want to know how to alleviate the painful consequences. Unfortunately, many people are looking for a silver bullet in the form of a simple formula or for the pastor or counselor to tell them exactly what to do. Telling them occasionally that you will not give them a rule or a command and expect them to follow orders strictly frustrates them. You may even be labeled as “unloving.” Sometimes, the person may be given principles and guidance with options, but that person must wrestle through the issue and make his own decisions.
When people are in trouble, they tend to revert to authoritarianism. It is simple. Follow the rules. Obey commands. Treat the world as an impersonal machine that operates by formulaic cause-and-effect. Expect everything to be fixed without time and work. People like authoritarianism at times because it alleviates personal responsibility. If I check everything off the list and “it doesn’t work,” it is your fault.
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On October 24, 2024
By Bill Smith
In Church, Discipleship, Theology
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What if your pastor DMed you about an interpersonal relationship problem that you were having and then said, “Oh yeah, when you are finished reading this, read this or have this read to the entire church”? First, you might be a little peeved that he was digging into your business. He needs to mind his own business. My relationships at home, work, and with my friends are none of his business. Second, if you are a typical American Christian, you’d probably find another church to rid yourself of this “spiritually abusive pastor.” Then, you would get on social media and talk about how you have suffered from the abuse of spiritual power, gain a following, and start an intersectional community of all those who have been DMed by their pastor about their relationships.
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On October 16, 2024
By Bill Smith
In Church, Discipleship, Prayer, Theology, Worship
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In the beginning, the Speaker spoke the Word. The Word went out from the Speaker, carried along by the Breath, and the world was created, formed, and filled. Speaker, Word, and Breath working in loving, powerful union with one another to create from nothing everything that is.
The height of this creative activity was the creation of man himself, the image of God. He is a creaturely word, a revelation of God within the creation. This form fashioned from the dust of the ground was himself filled with the Spirit-Breath of God. This Spirit empowered him to take the creation given to him and, by word and deed, follow in the image of God to create, arrange, form, and fill this creation so that it will one day reflect God’s own heavenly throne room. This is his dominion task.
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On September 19, 2024
By Bill Smith
In Discipleship, Prayer, Theology, Worship
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Likewise the Spirit also helps in our weaknesses. For we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. Now He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He makes intercession for the saints according to God. ~Romans 8:26-27
At this time, in the created order, a hauntingly bright symphony is being performed. The creation is groaning and travailing in the pains of childbirth like the deep, resonating, sad tones of a cello. The groans of the cello are joined in the same melodic progression by the violins of Christians’ groaning. As Christians, we find ourselves in harmony with the creation, giving it further voice because we share in the same pain, waiting with the rest of creation for the redemption of our bodies. But there is a third voice, a voice deeper and more fundamental in this symphony that controls it and moves it toward its conclusion. It is the double bass of the Spirit, groaning out wordless music to the Father. We and the rest of creation with us have joined with him so that we are taking up his groans, and he is taking up our groans in this symphony of prayer.
This is praying in the Spirit.
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On September 12, 2024
By Bill Smith
In Church, Discipleship, Theology
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Tychicus. Onesimus. Aristarchus. Mark. Justus. Epaphras. Luke. Demas. Nymphas. Archippus. If you know your Scriptures really well, several of these names are familiar to you. Mark and Luke wrote two of the Gospels. Onesimus is a focus of Paul’s brief letter to Philemon. The others are not so well known. Tychicus is mentioned several times in the New Testament as Paul’s companion. Epaphras is highlighted in the opening of the letter to the Colossians. If you know Demas at all, it is probably because he is infamous for abandoning Paul “having loved this present world” (2 Tim 4:10). What they all hold in common is that they are all mentioned at the end of Colossians either sending greetings, being exhorted, or receiving praise.
It’s often tempting to skim over Paul’s greetings at the end of his letters. The main body of the letter is complete, so we tend to tune out as we continue reading or listening just to check off our daily Bible reading. However, if God has included these greetings in the letter, there must be a significant reason why the church needs them. These greetings are not mere formalities, but they carry a deeper message that we should not overlook.
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On September 5, 2024
By Bill Smith
In Discipleship, Work
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For the past two hundred-plus years, the Western Church has been in the grips of a dualism that pits the material world against the non-material world (which they unadvisedly call “spiritual”). This is nothing new in the church. We have been fighting this for almost two millennia in one form or another. Material things are intrinsically evil and must be shed. The great salvation will come when I die and shed this mortal coil to live in a disembodied bliss in heaven. When Jesus comes again, he will destroy this mortal world, putting an end to its evil.
This dualistic view of reality affects the way we understand Jesus’ commission in Matthew 28:19-20. Whatever Jesus tells us, he is not telling us our mission has anything to do with this material world. Fighting culture wars with the gospel is like rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic … or entering into a theological debate on social media: a waste of time. Jesus’ Commission is all about snatching souls out of the world so that they can leave this world behind along with us.
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