Growing In Grace

The Westminster Shorter Catechism opens with the famous question, "What is the chief end of man?" To which the answer is, "Man's chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy Him forever." If this is true, and I believe that it certainly is, then all sin is stealing God's glory. We sin whenever we fail to give God the glory that He is due by not obeying and loving Him supremely. There are a number of very distinct examples of glory thieves in the Bible such as Pharaoh and Nebuchadnezzar. Pharaoh was seen as godlike in Egypt and he was furious at the demands of Yahweh's servant Moses that Pharaoh was to obey this greater authority. The children's movie account of the Exodus "The Prince of Egypt" portrays Pharaoh's self love so well when Pharaoh says, "I am the morning and the evening star." Pharaoh exulted in his power and position, but God was unrelenting in His demonstration of His sovereign power and Pharaoh's hardness of...

My daughter just completed Kindergarten and she has been learning to read. I love reading with her, it is such a joy! We read her "Jesus Storybook Bible" by Sally Lloyd-Jones (an excellent children's Bible!) together and she slowly makes her way through sounding out the larger words. At times she will finish reading a paragraph, point to a couple words from one sentence and say, "That doesn't make any sense." I then show her how the words fit together within the context of the sentence and then the larger context of the paragraph which can help clarify the confusion for her. On occasion she will still say that it doesn't make sense. At that point, I zoom all the way out and I remind her of the big picture that the story is telling, and then work my way back in close to explain what is being said in light of the story. This usually clears things up nicely, but sometimes confusion remains and so I have one final pedagogical (teaching) aid that I offer to...