by Rob Plummer
Most mornings, I get up and prepare three large mugs of hot tea (two for me, one for my wife). I set out my favorite mugs.
I boil the water in a kettle. I scoop the aromatic loose-leaf tea into a strainer and then pour the boiling water over the leaves. After 5-minutes of steeping, I add sugar and milk (British style). I start a crackling fire. (Well, I press “play” for a crackling fire video on YouTube.)
I settle down on the living room couch while it’s still dark and quiet to sip my tea and read my Greek New Testament.
The New Testament only gives us two sacred rituals or ordinances—baptism and the Lord’s Supper. Yet, by consciously embracing other non-sacred rituals, we attach the totality of ourselves to a habit, directing our lives towards things we choose to value.
One of Jesus’ most well-known—but difficult—statements is found in Matthew 16:24: “If anyone wants to come with Me, he must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow Me” (HCSB; εἴ τις θέλει ὀπίσω μου ἐλθεῖν, ἀπαρνησάσθω ἑαυτὸν καὶ ἀράτω τὸν σταυρὸν αὐτοῦ καὶ ἀκολουθείτω μοι). Notice that in this verse we find two aorist imperatives (ἀπαρνησάσθω and ἀράτω) and one present imperative (ἀκολουθείτω). Why is there a shift in tense-forms and how should they be interpreted?
Find out what sets 
Recent decades have witnessed a renewed and vigorous interest in the doctrine of God within evangelical theology. Theologians from the broad evangelical spectrum have produced both differing and innovative reformulations in understanding just who God is and how he relates to the world he has made.
To become a seasoned expositor of God’s Word requires a method, or a series of specific steps. Equally important, however, is one’s starting point, which is, sadly, quite often lacking. One’s starting point is important not only for learning how to become a better expositor, but also as a means of attaining reverence for God, another aspect of biblical exposition that is often overlooked. In short, we start—and stay—with God.
In 1856 Elias Lyman Magoon, pastor of Oliver Street Baptist Church, New York, published a collection of the sermons of Charles Haddon Spurgeon. Magoon had visited Britain in the previous decade and continued to be supplied with newspapers from the United Kingdom. He had written two books on oratorical achievements past and present. The New York pastor was therefore fascinated to discover that a youthful preacher of his own denomination had taken London by storm.
Enduring Truth argues that faithfulness to Scripture is the solution to a “crisis” among African American preaching. Though misinterpreting God’s Word is not restricted to one race or culture, author Aaron Lavender identifies three factors that have precipitated the decline of black preaching specifically: racial segregation, black liberation theology, and prosperity theology.
