Posted in Useful Resources Richard John|9:28 AM GMT|May 22nd

The author of this gem of a booklet pastors Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis, U.S.A. John Piper is a thought-provoking, prolific, sometimes provocative, but always Bible-centred, author.

I’d come across his book Don’t Waste Your Life, but the title of this booklet stopped me in my tracks - Don’t Waste Your Cancer…?! This grabbed my attention (as intended!).

If we are really honest, our immediate reaction to the word cancer is always negative, and probably everyone reading this either knows someone who has got, or has had, cancer – or has experienced it themselves.

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Posted in Interesting Thoughts Carl Laferton|1:27 PM GMT|May 21st

I am the reigning TGBC fantasy football champion, and also Senior Editor. For someone who is paid to write for a living, I find scribbling these biography things really hard.

Interesting and not-so-interesting things about me:

  • I have been a Christian since 2000. I’d been taken (reasonably involuntarily) to church as a child, but when I got to uni there was a guy down my corridor who was a “real” Christian. His lifestyle, and most of all his joy, challenged me, and I started going to his church, heard the gospel, and found the source of my friend’s joy.

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Posted in Fighting the Monday Feeling Martin Cole|8:57 AM GMT|May 21st

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

2 Corinthians 5 v 17 – 6 v 2

Reconciliation is God restoring the friendship with Him that we broke by sinning. Jesus became like us (treated by God as His enemy) so that we might become more like God.

Posted in Interesting Thoughts Tim Thornborough|10:00 AM GMT|May 19th

There's another rainbow I regularly see in the Good Book Company offices. And it's not welcome!

As we are an über-cool organisation, we work on Apple Macs - the Ferraris of the computing world.

Mac users are known for being loyal evangelists of the brand, but at the risk of being branded a hardware heretic by the Mac-zealots , there are times when I could happily throw mine out of the window. There are times when, inexplicably, it just seizes up, and instead of a wristwatch ticking round, or a progress bar creeping across the screen, you get what is colloquially known as "The spinning wheel of death".

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Posted in Relevant News Carl Laferton|2:01 PM GMT|May 18th

There are many ways to cheat in order to win an argument without having to actually defend your view. One is to call your opponent a “Nazi”. Another is to label them a “bigot”.

In an interesting blog this week, Ed West quotes a surprising turn of events. The National Secular Society’s attacking the Advertising Standards Agency (ASA) which asked a Christian blogger, to justify placing a Coalition for Marriage advert on his blog.

Here’s what they said:

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Posted in Best Buy Friday David Berkeley|10:35 AM GMT|May 18th

So many people have been loving our first Infographic on 1 and 2 Kings that we've decided that our Friday deals should be focused on our Kings resources.

We're doing 25% off the brilliant commentaries by Dale Ralph Davis on 1 Kings and 2 Kings and an amazing 40% off on the new 1 Kings Good Book Guide by James Hughes. No code needed for the commentaries but use code kings40 at the checkout for the Good Book Guide to get the savings.

For our US customers, use the same code, kings40, at the checkout for the Good Book Guide.

Enjoy!


Offer expires on 25/05/12

Posted in Relevant News Tim Thornborough|9:59 AM GMT|May 17th

It's officially the wettest drought on record in England.

Since the hosepipe ban in the South East started 6 weeks ago, it just hasn't stopped raining. The unrelenting grey gloom out of the window of The Good Book Company offices in Epsom is only interrupted by the occasional delight of a rainbow. The appearance of which tells us that the latest shower has passed by, and the sun is out.

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Posted in Useful Resources Andre Parker|10:46 AM GMT|May 16th
Posted in On to a Good Thing Phil Grout|4:15 PM GMT|May 15th
1. Articles on Sermon Prep and Preaching
 
What Sermon Prep Really Looks Like
8 Ways to Pray During Sermon Preparation
6 Bullet Points on Preaching
 
2. 4 Reasons to Remember Your Creator in Your Youth
 
David Murray of Ligonier Ministries shares these great reasons.
 
3. The Book of 1 Corinthians in 40 Tweets
 
Jonathan Parnell of Desiring God summarises the book in a series of tweets.
 
4. The Pastor's Wife
 
The third part of a three part series by The Gospel Coalition looking at the primary ministry of a pastor's wife.
 
5. And finally…
 
Our video of the week from Cornerstone Church Kingston. The first in their 'A-Z of Christianity' series, starting with the topic of Adoption:
 
 
 

Found something that you think should make it on to the On to a Good Thing round-up? Send it to: ontoagoodthing@thegoodbook.co.uk
Posted in Interesting Thoughts Helen Thorne|1:14 PM GMT|May 15th

If you’ve ever found it hard to keep your priorities right or your diary tight... If you’ve ever wondered how to stay engaged and enthusiastic in whatever ministry God has equipped you to serve... then you have experienced a struggle that is common to most of us who are active in the local church. A struggle that, if not addressed carefully and biblically, can drag us down.

At a seminar at the Christian Resources Exhibition last week a group of church administrators and I spent 45 minutes looking at how we could use the principle of purposeful pairs to help us persevere in the face of such difficulties.

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Posted in Interesting Thoughts Tim Thornborough|1:46 PM GMT|May 14th

I looked up the word Career in the dictionary the other day and the definition resonated. It said:

"Career (verb): An uncontrolled headlong rush normally ending in disaster"

I grew up in a "non-believing" home, with some pretty wild older siblings. Dysfunctional doesn't quite describe it. When I first started going to a gospel-teaching church as a teenager, I was drawn to a warm Christian family, and eventually responded to the message that made me a part of it.

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