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No Blessing Like Health – Except Sickness – A poignant reminder that it is often our infirmities that make us more effective ambassadors for God.

Escaping the Train to Auschwitz – This is a powerful story of one young boy’s capture and evasion, and how he shares his story with the next generation to ensure that a similar tragedy never happens again.

Envy Hunts in a Pack – “But even gospel-driven sanctification can misfire. Instead of actually applying the gospel to the sin in our hearts, we just wave the disinfectant at the gunk, acting as though the mere presence of the gospel will have some magic effect. We can’t just wield the gospel like a mantra that is supposed to spontaneously transform the filth into fullness and fruit.”

The Lost of Mentoring – This article offers three essentials to mentoring and gives us reasons why we should consider making the investment to do so.  (H/T)

Is Sincerity Enough? – “So a person can be very sincere and not believe in that objective truth. But will their sincerity keep them from experiencing the consequences of not believing in and trusting in Christ? This is where I think we need to realize that by all means we should be encouraging and tolerant (in the right sense) of people’s different viewpoints—but in the end, let’s not apologize for what Jesus actually said. We shouldn’t minimize it by saying, “Well, the important thing is that people are sincere.” Well, it is important whether or not people are sincere. But in the end, it’s also extremely important whether they are right and believe what is true.”

Real Beauty – “We are tempted and begin to think, Oh, it’s not that bad. I deserve this. It’s not a big deal. But the minute we give into sin, Satan twists things by overvaluing the sin and undervaluingthe power of the cross. Once we’ve sinned, we jump to thoughts of never being able to be forgiven, of grace not being enough, of being too evil, too dirty and too unrighteous. That is why the truth of what Christ has done is so amazing. When we confess our sins, God forgives us. He sees what Jesus has done, and He accepts us as clean and holy. He sees us as beautiful.”

Five Ways to Avoid the Drain of Busyness – Feeling overwhelmed and drained by all you have committed to? This article offers five helpful ways to avoid that.

Washing the Feet of the Saints – “We should never think we are above doing these “foot-washing” kind of jobs. Neither should we underestimate their significance. Even the grubbiest of tasks are holy, if done for the glory of Jesus Christ. After all, didn’t our Savior Himself stoop to wash the feet of his disciples? We should consider it an honor to do dirty jobs for Him.”

The “Right Time” God – “Don’t mistake God’s patience for His indifference. Understand that God will act when God will act, and that His time of action is going to be right. We know this of course. Of course we do. But that’s about the second coming of Jesus. The first coming of Jesus happened in a similar way. Not early, and not late, but right on time…”

Non-Christian Complementarianism? – In regards to a recent interview with Gabrielle Reece, the author remarks “[a]s I watched this, it occurred to me that someone might conclude that this is a non-Christian version of complementarian marriage. But actually, ‘non-Christian complementarianism’ is a contradiction in terms—something on the order of ’round square’ or ‘four-sided triangle.'”

Jackie Robinson & The Pattern of Jesus – Jackie Robinson’s impact on baseball is well-known. This post looks at what enables him to have that impact even when many were against him.

A Special Request Home run – This article should be read by all baseball fans, and if you aren’t one, you should read it anyway.