Richard Lovelace had a very significant impact on my thinking while in seminary. I was fortunate enough to take his course, Dynamics of Spiritual Life, his magnum opus which is essentially a holistic vision of renewal, rooted in the theology of Jonathan Edwards. Lovelace outlines preconditions, primary and secondary elements, for living life in a constant state of spiritual renewal. His grasp of the dyanmics of spiritual life throughout church history and in discipleship was so impacting that I made up a song to reflect his primary elements of renewal (justification, sanctification, the power of the Spirit, and  authority in  spiritual warfare), which my wife and I still sing.

Jimmy Davis has nicely summarized some of Lovelace’s contributions by reviewing his Renewal As a Way of Life. Read teh article here. Better yet buy the book. Last time I talked to Lovelace he was reading the paper in the mornings Luther’s commentary on Galations during the day, and working on his memoirs in the evenings. Above all, Lovelace embodied his teachings with passion, humility, and a ferocious love for Christ and his kingdom coming on earth.

Books & Culture has a fascinating and informative article on the impact of global birth rates. Popluation control has become a hip issue among liberal urbanites. However, as Phillip Longman points out, most of the world’s countries are in birth rate decline, which will negatively affect global and local economies. Less workers, weaker economies.

Of course, certain strands of environmental philosophy argue that we exist for the earth, not the earth for man, and as a result we have a responsiblity to scale back global population growth to replete our natural resources. This issue is complex. Longman provides some clarity here. What are your thoughts?

Here is  an excerpt from Nine Marks newsletter, devoted to preaching:

We call expositional preaching the first mark in a healthy church because we believe if you get that right, the other marks follow. You’ll hear this theme surface again and again in this issue’s articles. Mike Gilbart-Smith leads the way by comparing what he calls “authoritative” preaching to recent proposals for “conversational” preaching. Ajith Fernando, Al Mohler, Kevin Smith, and Derek Thomas offer their two cents on that question. Mark Driscoll takes on the proposal for narrative preaching, while former Trinity preaching prof Mike Bullmore presents a defense for expositional preaching. And postmodernism, the cause of so much hand-wringing these days about what “should” happen the “pulpit,” is re-considered by “Carl Trueman.”

See the whole letter here.

“In a new book called Social Intelligence, author Daniel Goleman explores the fascinating “neural ballet” that connects humans brain-to-brain. And guess what? Goleman concludes that we are hard-wired to connect. According to the author, ‘Neuroscience has discovered that our brain’s very design makes it sociable, inexorably drawn into an intimate brain-to-brain linkup whenever we engage with another person.'”

See the whole article here.