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Articles Christianity Personal

The War Against Boys

Titus, Snow, and A Little Bit of Traveling

Dr. Christine Hoff Somers is the author of a new book called, “The War Against Boys.” While interviewing her on my weekly radio program, Generations, she told the listening audience that the modern school is dangerous for boys. It is producing boys that are feminized, awkward, rebellious, or otherwise ill-prepared for life. Only 43% of students attending college today are boys, and that number continues to drop. Schools are increasingly designed for girls. Meanwhile, boys are disenfranchised and disinterested. Removing a boy’s unique purpose and preparation in life, setting him in a girl’s world, and then putting him in competition with girls will only produce devastating consequences for our social and economic systems. Actually, it’s already happening. The number of children born without fathers, where the father is nowhere to be found, has risen from 5% to 35% just in the last 30 years.

Older article, but still relevant. Read the entire article here.

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Personal

5 Twitter Accounts That Daily Remind Me of God’s Grace

Say what you will about social networking, but God is using these tools to remind me of His abundant grace. Each and every day we have access to incredible minds and hearts. Even with a limit of 140 characters, truths from God’s Word and God’s people are being delivered to me each and every day via Twitter. This is simply and utterly the grace of God and I’m thankful for it. So here’s some top picks from this week. Follow them, learn from them, retweet, share, etc.

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Inspiration Personal Photography

Tire Swing

Tire Swing
©2011 Shay Thomason. A little girl swings on a tire at a backyard wedding reception in LaPorte, Colorado.

Believe it or not, I wasn’t shooting a wedding when I captured this. I was actually in a wedding as a groomsman for my best-friend Zach, and this girl happens to be one of the pastor’s daughters. They had a backyard wedding reception and there was a tire swing in the very back that the little girl’s were playing on. I couldn’t resist once I saw what they were doing so I grabbed my camera and ran back there. I took about 3 photos and got this one. I was stoked.

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Christianity Family Personal

10,000 Little Moments of Change

Paul Tripp teaches at a conference in Hollywood, CA (Reality LA Church).
Paul Tripp teaches at a conference in Hollywood, CA (Reality LA Church).

I had the privilege of sitting under the teaching Paul Tripp this past weekend at a conference called “Back to Heart of Parenting”. It was a great reminder about the power of the Gospel in parenting and Paul Tripp is a fountain of wisdom and I praise God for his ministry.

He’s been blogging a bit more lately, which I love, and a blog he published yesterday is just a great reminder about the “10,000 moments” in our lives that mold and shape us. He writes,

…biblical Christianity, which has the Gospel of Jesus Christ at its heart, simply doesn’t rest its hope in big, dramatic moments of change. The fact of the matter is that the transforming work of grace is more of a mundane process than it is a series of a few dramatic events. Personal heart and life change is always a process. And where does that process take place? It takes place where you and I live everyday.

Later he adds,

What leads to significant personal change? 10,000 moments of personal insight and conviction, 10,000 moments of humble submission, 10,000 moments of foolishness exposed and wisdom gained, 10,000 moments of sin confessed and sin forsaken, 10,000 moments of courageous faith, 10,000 choice points of obedience, 10,000 times of forsaking the kingdom of self and running toward the kingdom of God, 10,000 moments when we abandon worship of the creation and give ourselves to worship of the Creator. And what makes all of this possible? Relentless, transforming, little-moment grace.

Read the rest.

I strongly suggesting following Paul Tripp on Twitter and adding his blog to your RSS Reader.

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Books Personal

Goodreads

Goodreads

One of my favorites sites right now is Goodreads. Their “About Us” page describes the service this way:

Goodreads is the largest social network for readers in the world. We have more than 5,200,000 members who have added more than 160,000,000 books to their shelves. A place for casual readers and bona-fide bookworms alike, Goodreads members recommend books, compare what they are reading, keep track of what they’ve read and would like to read, form book clubs and much more. Goodreads was launched in December 2006.

I’ve been using it for about a year now and I’m really starting to understand why I like it so much. The above image is data that Goodreads provides me about the books I’ve read over the past few years, with specifics to the amount of pages. In 2010 I read 1047 pages. So far this year I’ve read 861 pages. I can set goals on the number of books I want to read in a year (I’m hoping for 12 this year), and I can update my “current page” any time I want to see progress percentages and other info. You might be thinking this is pretty nerdy, and yes, it is. But the fun part about Goodreads is you can keep track of the books you own, get recommendations on books from friends, and kind of keep yourself accountable to a good reading schedule. I normally use their iPhone app to update my pages when I finish reading for the day and it’s quick and easy. Also, if you’ve never seen my “Bookshelf”, it’s a complete list of my books embedded in to my website that is automatically generated from Goodreads. Go see for yourself. So if you’re a reader (and I hope you are), then definitely check out Goodreads.