3 Reasons to Prioritize Your Marriage Over Your Children – Jesus our Savior—and our example of what a bridegroom truly is—laid down his life for his bride (Eph. 5:25). He doesn’t neglect her for another. And it’s this relationship of our Savior to his bride that governs our understanding of our role as husbands and family shepherds. We must give ourselves to and for our wives. We must view them not only as ours but as us! As I often remind myself concerning my wife, “She’s not just mine; she’s me. She’s bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh (Gen. 2:23); she’s my body (Eph. 5:28–29), and I am her head (1 Cor. 11:3; Eph. 5:23). We are one (Eph. 5:31; see also Gen. 2:24); and our union is a blessing to our children (1 Cor. 7:14).” – Voddie Baucham
Remember Memory – The worship wars could have been mitigated greatly if younger generations wanting newer songs had taken the time to remember memory. Church leaders may say, “It’s about reaching young people.” Or, “We need music that resonates with the culture.” These may even be good reasons to change some things. But we have to realize that those who grew up with hymns don’t just lose the songs they prefer, they lose continuity with their past. They lose a whole lifetime worth of experiences–happy times, sad times, birth, marriage, death–a thousand bits of life that get embedded in the songs we’ve always sung. – Kevin DeYoung
Saint Nicholas: Can Santa Claus Be Saved? – Now, while Santa Claus in its present form is a fairy tale, there really was a Santa Claus. His name, “Santa Claus” is an Anglicized form of the Dutch Sinter Klaas, which in turn means “Saint Nicholas.” Nicholas was a Christian bishop in the fourth century who apparently attended the Council of Nicea and supported the doctrine of the Trinity. The tradition that he was especially kind toward children, even giving them gifts, is very likely based on fact. Thus Christians might justifiably look to the real Saint Nicholas as a hero of the Christian faith. – Hank Hanegraaff
Does Writing ‘Xmas’ Take Christ out of Christmas? – The idea of X as an abbreviation for the name of Christ came into use in our culture with no intent to show any disrespect for Jesus. The church has used the symbol of the fish historically because it is an acronym. Fish in Greek (ichthus) involved the use of the first letters for the Greek phrase “Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior.” So the early Christians would take the first letter of those words and put those letters together to spell the Greek word for fish. That’s how the symbol of the fish became the universal symbol of Christendom. There’s a long and sacred history of the use of X to symbolize the name of Christ, and from its origin, it has meant no disrespect. – R.C. Sproul
Southern Baptists to Keep ‘Baptist’ in Name – As the Southern Baptist Convention considers changing its 166-year-old name in order to reach more people for Christ, denominational leaders have made it clear that they don’t plan on removing “Baptist” from its name. – Christian Post
On Church Hopping and Church Shopping – I pose this question, Do we really go to church for activities and events, convenience and comfort, to have our egos stroked and our desires met? Do we never consider that the church might need us? What part should each of us play in the health, growth and ministry of the church? Is church shopping and church swapping simply a matter of wanting a place that provides us with a since of being ’spiritual’ but does not require that we think, respond, receive correction, get provoked with Truth and actually make investments in something that does not give us direct and immediate benefit? Have we developed a mentality that says, “If this doesn’t work for me, I’ll just split and give it a shot somewhere else?” Has a church home become “all about me?” – Dan Burrell
Chuck Phelps Resigns from the BJU Board – I think that it is high time that fundamentalism wakes up to how devastating to one’s reputation mishandling of abuse cases really should be, and how horrific a crime these sorts of allegations (of sexual abuse) really are. Fundamentalists are all to ready to excuse leaders because they don’t have all the facts or because they’ve done their legal duty. But there is a further moral duty which fundamentalists often do not undertake. Tim Henderson, of Campus Crusade for Christ, talks of “the deficiency of love” in response to the Penn State scandals. And there seems to be a similar problem in some degree, with the response that Fundamentalist leaders and institutions often have to cases of alleged abuse. Let this whole affair be a wake up call to our God-given duty to defend the weak and help the hurting, rather than defend those in places of prominence and power. – Bob Hayton
The Thompsonian Times 