To the degree that you have based your life on something other than the Lord, to that degree God’s love and the hope of the gospel will not comfort you. You will not be comforted because you are hungry for another kind of bread. You long for a king who will give you the bread you crave. The bread might be a relationship, circumstance, or position. It might be human love and respect, the desire for vengeances, or a certain economic state. It literally can be anything in creation! But there are only two types of bread: Christ, the living bread, and everything else. We set our hearts either on him or something else. (Paul Tripp, War of Words)

by Cesar Vigil-Ruiz

Feliz Friday! I pray your week has been filled with seeking the Lord in the Word and in prayer. Before the week ends, however, I pray you will be helped by this week’s links.

• Dallas Theological Seminary professor and textual critic Daniel Wallace writes of lexical fallacies that linguists typically make, which has a lot to do with how we interpret (or misinterpret) Scripture. You might want to bookmark this, so you don’t make the same mistakes.
• Joe Carter continues his series in apologetics and worldview analysis with an explanation of the moral argument for God’s existence. He highlights a new video from former sociopath, now apologist for the faith, David Wood. This video powerfully and deftly explains the power of the Gospel in turning someone fully and unashamedly rebellious towards God to now a lover and defender of God. WARNING: This video contains gritty details of Mr. Wood’s past, so discretion is advised.
• What are the moments in parenting that radically change the way you view raising your children? Listen in as three moms explain their paradigm-shifting moments that have caused them to realign their view of motherhood with God’s.
• Though posted a couple weeks back, Bob Somerville, professor at The Master’s College, wrote a book on the issue of Christians who get depressed. He gives a great interview with ACBC Executive Director, Heath Lambert.
• Fred Butler has written a short comparison between classical/evidential apologetics (the most popular forms of defending the Christian faith) and presuppositional apologetics (the method advocated by Cornelius Van Til, Greg Bahnsen, James White, and, I would add, Scripture). If you have any interest in learning how to defend the faith, you will gain much from learning the distinctions between these two.
• From a previous Weekly Links post, I mentioned the current attack on Jesus that was coming out in the form of a documentary from Simcha Jacobovici. New Testament scholar Richard Bauckham has written a thorough response to the claims made in the corresponding book, which can be accessed here. This is certainly an opportunity to speak truth in a culture that is bent on finding reasons to disbelieve. Let’s seize it for God’s glory!
• Christian theologian and philosopher professor James Anderson wrote an article on worldviews in Ligonier’s monthly magazine, TableTalk. Short, sweet, and to the point.
• John Piper wrote an insightful post for college students that would do them good: “Don’t Waste Your University Years.“
• When working at a new job, or even if you’ve been at a certain position for a time, usually training is required for you to be more effective at what you do, or to learn new skills for future projects. When it comes to training in Christ, what does that look like? And why do people seem to shy away from it? Phil Colgan believes it to be viewing training as skill development, and not for a life of godliness and service. I really appreciated this article, and think you will too.
• What are the benefits of sitting under expository preaching (making the point of a passage in Scripture the point of the sermon), the kind of preaching Lighthouse regularly sits under? Eric Davis at The Cripplegate gives us seven reasons, and if you are in any doubt about this type of preaching, let this post influence and encourage you in your time with us.

That’s all for this week! Looking forward to worshiping together as a church family, and continuing to anticipate the celebration of the birth of our Savior!

Soli Deo Gloria