featured Archives - Page 5 of 6 - Timothy Paul Jones

Theology: The Price of Trying To Be God

29th September 2016

To sin is to use a gift that God provided for the purpose of pointing to his glory in a way that the Creator never intended. That’s how God’s good gift of relaxation degenerates into vacations that end in frustration because they fall short of our self-centered expectations. That’s how God’s gifts of food and drink […]

Family Ministry: How a Parent’s Role Changes through the Stages of a Child’s Life

28th September 2016

If you’re a parent, what’s your goal for parenting? My parenting purpose statement is simply this: Our purpose is to leverage our children’s lives so that people in every nation will receive multiplied opportunities to respond in faith to the rightful King of kings.

Apologetics: The Earliest Surviving Listing of the New Testament Canon

26th September 2016

The claim has been repeated over and over that the first person to list the same twenty-seven books that we find in our New Testament today was Athanasius of Alexandria, in the year 367. When this claim comes from the lips of a skeptical scholar, it’s typically followed by a long leap to the conclusion that […]

D6 Conference: Planning Your Time in Louisville

20th September 2016

Beginning tomorrow, hundreds of church leaders will arrive in the city of Louisville to attend this year’s D6 Conference. If you’re not familiar with D6, it’s far more than a conference; it’s a place where ministry teams can gather each year to learn, worship, pray, and strategize about how to embed God’s truth in the lives of the next […]

Apologetics: How Long Was the Canon in Question?

19th September 2016

The Canon of the New Testament and the Categories of Eusebius The suggestion continues to be made by popular skeptics that the New Testament canon was in flux for hundreds of years. One scholar claims that no one came up with “a definitive list of books to be included in the canon that matched our list today” […]

Church History: The Racist Heresy in Southern Baptist History

15th September 2016

The founders of the Southern Baptist Convention and of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary were zealous defenders of biblical orthodoxy. They were also heretics.

Family Ministry: A Better Story for Your Parenting

14th September 2016

Data and arguments aren’t the strategies that do the best job of convincing people to change their lives. What convinces people best is the promise of a better story than the one they’re presently living. That’s why every leader should be—in the words of R. Albert Mohler—a steward-in-chief of [the organization’s] story. … Leadership comes down […]

Theology: How Free Is Humanity?

13th September 2016

How free are your choices? Do human beings possess free will? Does God determine your choices or do you? Part of the answer depends on how you define “freedom” and “free will”! With that in mind, let’s take a closer look at the notions of human freedom and free will. Does God Save People Against Their […]

Writing: Using Evernote to Write Your Book

8th September 2016

Evernote has been an essential tool in the completion of my past two books, and several of my doctoral students have asked me to describe how I use Evernote to move projects from initial ideas and tables of contents to completed book manuscripts.

Family Ministry: How to Minister to Families in Crisis

7th September 2016

While I was participating in the D6 Connect Tour earlier this year, my friend Ron Hunter asked me to share some ideas about how to minister to children and youth whose parents don’t attend church. Bundled with an interview with Leneita Fix about serving families in crisis, D6 turned this conversation into a free resource […]

Theology: Do God’s Plans Ever Fail?

6th September 2016

Broken dreams are woven deeply into the fabric of human existence—so deeply that it’s easy for us to assume God’s plans fail, just like ours. In fact, that’s precisely what some theologians have claimed over the past few decades. According to one best-selling book from a certain Jewish rabbi, God wishes he could make everything right […]

Giveaway: Win a Free Copy of How We Got the Bible

5th September 2016

If you’re interested in winning a free copy of How We Got the Bible, I’m giving away multiple copies this week! To be entered for a chance to win, simply click this link: How We Got the Bible Giveaway You’ll need to have a Twitter account and an Amazon account to enter the contest for […]

Culture: A Quick Guide to the Marvel Cinematic Universe

3rd September 2016

At the center of God’s story stands this singular act: In Jesus Christ, God personally intersected human history and redeemed humanity at a particular time in a particular place. Yet this central marvel of redemption does not stand alone. It is bordered by God’s good creation and humanity’s fall into sin on the one hand […]

Culture: Remembering Emmett Till

2nd September 2016

In September 1955, the bloated and broken corpse of Emmett Till arrived in Chicago. His mother identified his body and made the decision to leave his casket open for the funeral. “Let the people see what I’ve seen,” she told the owner of the funeral home, and the people did. What they saw changed the world.

Family Ministry: The Best Tool to Filter Films for Your Family

31st August 2016

My family and I enjoy movies—a lot. The problem is, there are many movies that, for us at least, are too riddled with unnecessary profanity and sexual innuendo to enjoy together. And, honestly, I know that I myself am unable to deal well with any sexual nudity in a film. Other Christians have different convictions […]

Leadership: A Kingdom-Shaped Vision for Church Discipline

30th August 2016

“To him who … made us a kingdom, be glory and dominion forever,” John declared in the opening paragraphs of the apocalypse he penned on the island of Patmos (Revelation 1:5-6). Living in union with Christ the King, God’s new covenant people have been made into “a kingdom of priests” (Exodus 19:6). But what does […]

Apologetics: Is Inerrancy a Modern Invention?

29th August 2016

“Inerrancy” is the belief that the Bible never errs. It’s another way of saying that the Old and New Testaments—as they were originally written—declare what is true and describe accurately what happened in the past. To say the Bible is inerrant is to say that the Scriptures do not affirm anything that is contrary to […]

Culture: The Gospel and Racial Reconciliation

26th August 2016

Racial reconciliation is not primarily about healing the wounds of racial subjugation that so deeply scar our nation’s history. Racial reconciliation is not primarily about seeking justice for immigrants and refugees. It’s not about reducing conflict between persons with differing concentrations of melanin. It’s not even primarily about a systemic lack of opportunities for certain ethnicities—though all […]

Family Ministry: The Difference Between God’s Adoption and Ours

24th August 2016

Thirteen years ago, my wife and I sat at a table in a cramped office that reeked of scorched coffee and mildewed carpet. By that point in our lives, we had journeyed for nearly two years on a long and difficult road toward adoption. While social workers shuffled around us, we pored over page after […]

Leadership: Learning to Do Less So Parents in Your Church Can Do More

23rd August 2016

Parents in your ministry don’t have time to disciple their children—or, at least, that’s the way many of them feel when they look at their weekly to-do lists. According to comprehensive surveys and interviews with hundreds of parents, half of all church-involved parents have simply resigned themselves to the notion that their families are too busy […]