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Should I get married? Most of us don’t ask the question. We just assume we’ll get married and spend time thinking about whom we will marry.

Martin Luther, however, did ask that question. When he became a monk, he had taken a vow of celibacy and the Bible has stern things to say about those who break their vows. He also thought there was a good chance he would be martyred, soon. There were many people who wanted him dead. Should he marry when his wife could end up a widow before their first anniversary? Too, his Roman Catholic critics believed the new Protestant movement was just a cover for sexual licentiousness. If he got married and others followed his example, this would help silence the critics.

Luther struggled with the question and asked his parents about it. His father urged him to marry and have children, just like fathers everywhere, always, and at all times.

In Roman Catholicism, marriage was a sacrament and regulated by canon law that told you...

Note: Three days ago was the one-hundredth birthday of my dear mother-in-law, Margaret Louise Taylor. This past weekend, Mary Lee and I gathered with Mary Lee's nine siblings and their spouses, as well as Mom's brother-in-law and his wife, Lyman and J. Mae Taylor, to celebrate this wonderful occasion.1 

It would be hard to overstate the blessing Mom Taylor has been to all of us for many decades, now. Twenty years ago, thinking about Mom Taylor and my own mother, Mary Louise Bayly (who at the time was still living), I wrote this article as a tribute to them both. Now is a good opportunity to reproduce it as a hundredth birthday tribute to Mom. I hope it serves as a good reminder to readers of the true nature of biblical femininity, womanhood, and motherhood. Of truly sacrificial Christian faith.

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Mom Taylor studied for her degree in Home Economics during the late '30s and early '40s, graduating summa cum laude from Oregon State University. After marrying her childhood sweetheart, Ken Taylor, she gave birth to ten children in fourteen years.

Engaged for most of the years when the family was young as editorial director of a religious publishing house, her husband, Ken, brought home low wages, so frugality was a necessity and the degree served this young mother and her family very well...

A friend and I were talking on the phone one day when my friend told me he didn't allow his wife to attend his church's women's Bible study. I knew his pastor was good and his church was good, so I was shocked. "Why not," I asked?

He told me Scripture says wives should ask their husbands at home. He was referring to 1 Corinthians 14:34, 35:

The women are to keep silent in the churches; for they are not permitted to speak, but are to subject themselves, just as the Law also says. If they desire to learn anything, let them ask their own husbands at home; for it is improper for a woman to speak in church.

Knowing he hadn't been a Christian long, I probed to see if there was some harm the women of the church may have done to his wife; some emotional slight or alienation that might explain his decision...

This announcement from Trinity Presbyterian Church (PCA) in Spartanburg:

Evangelicalism has been gutted. The core has has been scooped out and little more than a thin shell remains. Churches are clubs, sermons are stand up, and the sheep are fed with the sawdust of entertainment. No wonder most Christians can’t define or defend basic doctrines of Scripture. Like the rest of the West, the church is amusing herself to death. 

The Reformed answer usually comes in the form of a toothless scholasticism. We find a way to do nothing that requires faith. Instead, we rest complacently within the technical confines of our confessions. In other words, we snore to Bach rather than Lady Gaga. 

This isn’t the faith of Calvin, Ryle, and Hodge. These men demonstrated that a mind possessed by the glories of biblical doctrines leads to a life of faith and holiness. Harry Blamires says, “The Christian mind is the prerequisite of Christian thinking, and Christian thinking is the prerequisite for Christian action.”

In just a few weeks, Dr. David Talcott, Assistant Professor of Philosophy at The King's College, will tackle how the church got here and what we can do to return to a Biblical way of thinking. We'd like to invite you to attend The Christian Mind conference at Trinity Presbytery Church in Spartanburg, SC on August 19 & 20. Then, in a Friday night concert, My Soul Among Lions will demonstrate the power the Psalms possess to shape the Christian mind. Both the conference and the concert are free. 

Here's a rundown of the sessions, followed by a link for more information and registration...

...each one of you is saying, “I am of Paul,” and “I of Apollos,” and “I of Cephas,” and “I of Christ.”  - 1Corinthians 1:12, 13

So, apparently, the sin of some in the Corinthian church was saying "I am of Christ."

A year and a half ago, I was talking with a Presbyterian counselor who was counseling an older single man who had physically and sexually abused several young men under his authority. Despite this predator's pastor and several of his elders a decade ago knowing of the specifics of his abuse of one victim, they had allowed the man to keep his job on the staff of their Presbyterian church where he continued to have young men under his authority. When his corruption of his first victim ten years ago became known, his pastor and several of his elders had refused to ask other young men under this man's leadership if he had abused them, also; nor had they warned them.

Now, the church's pastor and elders were finally having their noses shoved into the sins they and their predecessors had worked hard to avoid. They were finding out their church staff worker had abused more than the one man who had been known. Two more victims had come forward and were calling the church's session to acknowledge their past failures and bring this ministry leader under discipline and I was hoping to get the counselor to help with that process.

In our initial conversation, this counselor said he was...

We are excited to host our seventh annual Clearnote Summer Conference this July 10th and 11th! One of the best features of our conference is that it truly is a conference for the whole family. So, if you are thinking about attending but are wondering what the kids will be doing throughout the weekend, here is a sneak peek...

Who said of his father and his mother, ‘I did not consider them’; And he did not acknowledge his brothers, Nor did he regard his own sons... (Deuteronomy 33:9)

Probably the most scandalous parts of Scripture to those of us committed to the reform of marriage and family life are the places God warns us that we must put Him first, above our families. It's that "above our families" part that gets us, but this is what our God Whose Name is Jealous requires and He commends those who obey Him in it. The text above shows the blessing given to the Levites by Moses at the end of his life. He blessed them because in obedience to God's Word they slew their own brothers and sons (Exodus 32:25-29).

John Bunyan highlights the constancy of this choice between loved ones and God at the beginning his Pilgrim's Progress when he describes Christian running from the voices of his family who were crying after him to stop, turn around, and come back home. Covering his ears with his hands...

Under the post "Black mothers are switch-hitters...," a reader asks:

To clarify, you aren't justifying beating your child so bad you leave possible scars (as in AP's case), you are advocating beatings in the vein that most of us received as kids; ones that made us remember what we did wrong and why we shouldn't do it again, correct?

I respond:

Dear Matthew,

Thanks for your question.

First, I would not use the word 'beating,' but rather 'spanking'. Spanking communicates punishment that is intentional and constructive whereas beating communicates hostility and aggression and the release of one's temper, all of which are wrong with children.

As for AP's case, I haven't read the details. Concerning scars in child discipline, though, marks aren't scars. Scars are permanent and I can't ever imagine a spanking done in love that would leave physical scars. On the other hand, I regularly see young adults and older adults who are emotionally scarred for life by...

Homeschoolers can be a fractious bunch, so it's a wonder to behold how Homeschool Legal Defense Association's Michael Farris has been able to unify homeschoolers in supporting his work. For years now, he's spoken for homeschoolers as Tim Keller speaks for the Presbyterian Church in America and Bill Clinton speaks for the Democratic Party.

It's noteworthy, then, what Farris recently declared concerning manhood and womanhood in the wake of the fall of his fellow homeschool leaders, Doug Phillips and Bill Gothard. Posted to the HSLDA website, Farris starts by saying he doesn't intend to condemn Phillips and Gothard's sexual sins, but rather their teaching. It's a curious way to begin, but maybe his tack makes sense when you consider that Phillips and Gothard's teaching has been the same for many, many, years whereas their sexual sin is the new revelation hitting Farris now. You know, it takes him a while to decide what he thinks about things, so helped by the scandal surrounding their sexual sin, he's finally been able to come to an understanding concerning their teaching. You get my point?

Back around 1980, our Dad confronted Bill Gothard publicly in the pages of Eternity magazine. He wrote a column exposing Bill Gothard's teaching on authority and he took Gothard to task for his tolerance of sexual sin at Gothard's headquarters in Oak Brook, Illinois. Which is to say Gothard's failures are very, very old. So why didn't Michael Farris condemn Bill Gothard for his bad teaching many years ago?

Because men who want...