Friday Night Musings

September 18, 2009


**I’m writing this note from our hotel room in Birmingham, Alabama. We drove over from Tupelo this afternoon so we could have dinner with Nick and Elizabeth. Tomorrow we plan to visit the Alabama State Fair in nearby Pelham–if it ever stops raining. It seems like we’ve had rain for two weeks, and the current forecast calls for more rain for at least another week. My only complaint is that I don’t get in my bike riding when it rains.

**Even with the rain, I’ve ridden 1223 miles so far this year. In 2008 I rode 1070 miles for the whole year. 

**I’d like to recommend two books for your consideration, both of them by Mark Dever, the pastor of Capitol Hill Baptist Church in Washington, D.C. Over a period of several years, he preached through the Bible by preaching one sermon on each of the 66 books. To preach on an entire book in one message is a difficult task. To do it on every single Bible book is a mammoth accomplishment. The resulting sermons have been published in two large volumes:

The Message of the Old Testament: Promises Made  
The Message of the New Testament: Promises Kept 

Special thanks for H. B. Charles Jr. for introducing me to these fine books.

**It’s been a great month for the Anchor Book Depot. In August we shipped 2500 copies of An Anchor for the Soulto various ministries. In the last ten days we’ve shipped over 6000 copies to prisons in Virginia and Chattanooga, Tennessee. God has given us a tremendous opportunity to partner with the Mailbox Club, an organization that provides Bible lessons to children and prisoners. Each book will have a note from me along with an invitation from the Mailbox Club to participate in a Bible correspondence course.

And this week we shipped 368 Anchors to Military Moms in Action. The books will become part of “care packages” shipped to our soldiers serving in Iraq and Afghanistan and around the world.

**Check out the interview with Anne Graham Lotz in Time Magazine. She says that religion can be one of the greatest impediments to finding God.

**This week’s sermon email went out to 6534 people. That’s the first time we’ve crossed the 6500 mark. I was checking something and noticed that in November 2001 we had around 700 on the list. 
 
**One month from tonight the Keep Believing Holy Land tour departs from Chicago. You could still be part of it but you’ll have to hurry to sign up.
 
**And our big Friendship Banquet on October 1 is right around the corner. I’ve seen the video Josh made for the banquet and it’s amazing. Blew me away.
 
**Today we got an email update from Tom and Janine Throssel who serve with great effectiveness as missionaries in Bolivia. Janine writes to say that they have returned to the States on Home Assignment and plan to return to Bolivia next year. She ends her update this way:
In a sometimes bumpy and tumultuous journey on this planet, it is good to have friends and even better to know that we are held in the capable hands of an ever-loving, all-knowing, sovereign God.  Rest in his hands and love today!
I think we all understand about the bumpy and tumultuous part. For some folks, the journey right now is very bumpy indeed. So I commend Janine’s words to you as a benediction for today and the tomorrows yet to come.

Do you have any thoughts or questions about this post?