W4YW: Why 734 Pastors Quit, Our Age of Authenticity, & Email Rules

Wisdom For Your Weekend: your weekly installment of things we’ve been reading (and watching) around the web.

Video of the Week

Following Jesus in an Age of Authenticity, Russell Moore & Tim Keller. Whether you’re a Christian or not, chances are that you’re big into authenticity. After all, isn’t the alternative to being authentic being “fake?” As Keller and Moore point out, the core of the “authentic” life is the anti-biblical assertion: just be you! Helpful video here to expose and counter this winsome lie. (You can also check out this fascinating podcast with NYTimes’ David Brooks, dealing with many of the same issues.)

Articles of the Week

12 Golden Rules of Email Courtesy, T. David Gordon. Oh, how wonderful work life would be, if we all took Gordon’s rules to heart! If you send emails on a regular basis (um, everyone?), you need to read this list. And if you ever send me an email, you need to memorize this list.

The 10 Best Resources for Talking to Your Children about Porn, Luke Gilkerson. As Gilkerson points out, the prospect of talking to our kids about pornography sounds incredibly awkward. But I’ll deal with a healthy dose of awkward, when considering the disastrous alternative. Thankfully, there are tons of helpful resources out there, for varying ages, to help us start the conversation.

17 Lessons I Learned from Christian Books in 2015, Edmond Sanganyado. As John Wesley said, “Read or get out of the ministry.” But what you read is just as important as the fact that you read. So lists like this—commending books for specific reasons—will always be valuable. Learn from Sanganyado’s 2015 reading, and pick up a few of these for yourself in 2016.

Why 734 Pastors Quit (and How Their Churches Could Have Kept Them), Lisa Cannon Green. Lifeway conducted a research survey of 734 pastors who walked away from ministry last year before retirement. What went wrong? What could have prevented it? And what does that mean for your church, your pastor, and you—today?

On The Lighter Side

Knowledge of Traffic Laws. Be careful out there. Statistics show that most of the people on the road have passed a driving test.

driving 

Wisdom For Your Weekend is presented to you by Chris Pappalardo, with occasional guidance from J.D. Greear. This is our attempt to reflect Proverbs 9:9: “Give instruction to a wise man, and he will be still wiser; teach a righteous man, and he will increase in learning.”