Christian Living / Spiritual Growth

  • Rejoice with Trembling by John Piper

    FROM TABLETALK | February 2011

    “Serve the LORD with fear, and rejoice with trembling. Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and you perish in the way, for his wrath is quickly kindled. Blessed are all who take refuge in him.” (Ps. 2:11–12 …Read More

  • Thanks Be to God by Knox Chamblin

    FROM TABLETALK | March 2009

    In December 2008, I turned seventy-three. Invited by Tabletalk to address younger generations “on matters pertinent to the faith,” I thought of Psalm 71, the prayer of an elderly man. Says verse 18: “So even to old age and gray …Read More

  • A Matter of Life and Death by Burk Parsons

    FROM TABLETALK | January 2007

    The Christian marketplace is filled with T-shirts, tracts, and trinkets that speak of how to have the ideal Christian life. Every year, Christians spend millions of dollars on self-help books and “how-to” guides for living an abundant life. For …Read More

  • Basking in the Benefits by Kim Riddlebarger

    FROM TABLETALK | February 2009

    Q. What are the benefits which in this life do accompany or flow from justification, adoption, and sanctification?  A. The benefits which in this life do accompany or flow from justification, adoption, and sanctification, are, assurance of God’s love …Read More

  • Right Now Counts Forever by R.C. Sproul Jr.

    FROM TABLETALK | July 2010

    It was Augustine who argued that every sin is a failure to love ordinately. Sin is the result of either loving something more than we ought or the result of loving something less than we ought. We are to love …Read More

  • The Motivation for Love by Conrad Mbewe

    FROM TABLETALK | June 2012

    In his twentieth century classic, The Screwtape Letters, C.S. Lewis imagines the demon Screwtape writing to his nephew Wormwood about the need to discover the secret as to why God loves humans. He writes, “The truth is, I slipped …Read More

  • Is It Just a Money Issue? by Burk Parsons

    FROM TABLETALK | August 2009

    Several years after my father’s death in 1992 I found an old shoebox among my father’s belongings. Among the various items in the shoebox, I came across a stack of letters that my father had written just prior …Read More

  • Cynicism by John Sartelle

    FROM TABLETALK | February 2011

    Dear Shadow Guide, The enemy may now lay claim to your quarry, but he is still of great value to our cause. Our adversary, whom he now calls Lord, is not a realist. Idealism is the weakness of His kingdom …Read More

  • Beacon of Holiness by Alistair Begg

    FROM TABLETALK | October 2004

    “If the Word does not dwell with power in us,” wrote Puritan John Owen, “it will not pass with power from us” (The Works of John Owen, vol. 16, p. 76.). This godly minister personified this truth in his personal …Read More

  • Gossip by R.C. Sproul Jr.

    FROM TABLETALK | February 2011

    Our Lovely Blackheart, As you well know, the enemy has a rather unfair advantage in that He can — and delights — to make things out of nothing. Our powers are limited to perversion. This has not kept our father below from …Read More

  • Our Father … by R.C. Sproul

    FROM TABLETALK | April 2003

    My first class at the Free University of Amsterdam shattered my academic complacency. It was cultural shock, an exercise in contrasts. It started the moment the professor, Dr. G.C. Berkouwer, entered the room. At his appearance, every student stood …Read More

  • Christianity, Unplugged by K. Scott Oliphint

    FROM TABLETALK | June 2012

    When was the last time you withdrew? Not the last time you were the only person in the room or in the house — when was the last time you withdrew from contact with anyone else? Jesus “would withdraw” from the …Read More

  • With One Voice by Jack Kinneer

    FROM TABLETALK | April 2003

    English-speaking Christians around the world know the Lord’s Prayer in the wording of the King James Version (Matt. 6:9–13; Luke 11:2–4). Believers from diverse church traditions have this prayer in common and can recite it …Read More

  • The Puritans on Prayer by Colin Rowley

    FROM TABLETALK | April 2003

    Psalm 66:18 states, “If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear.” In our present day, how often do we hear the truth that God does not hear the prayers of the unrighteous? In my personal …Read More

  • The Fervent Prayer of a Righteous Man … by Douglas Kelly

    FROM TABLETALK | April 2003

    Our glorious, sovereign God created and controls the universe in a way that uses the prayers of His saints to accomplish His eternal purposes. Thus, He sovereignly uses their prayers to release His preordained blessings, and by this means to …Read More