Steel lore

AWANA TNT Boys Game Night

2011-09-05T04:53:00.000-07:00

Teaching Imperfect Sunday School Curriculum

2011-04-06T12:23:00.000-07:00

Since there isn't a perfect Sunday School curriculum, even ones that you have personally written for your own church, I guess I should have titled this "Teaching Sunday School Curriculum". But, that is boring and you wouldn't be reading to this point if I had entitled it as such. What do I mean? Every curriculum has its weak points, areas that you have to skip, rewrite completely or tweak for

A Wouk on the dark side

2011-04-04T14:30:00.000-07:00

Herman Wouk, the Cain mutinous, windy war and peaceful writer compiles his thoughts in a very good read. I happenstanced this book at the local library, intrigued by the title and the back cover description. I'm glad I did because this book is a real gift to the Christian. Plain and simple, this book is a window into the unbeliever's skeptical, agnostic mind. I learned so much about how the

Family Devotions and Discipleship in One Resource

2011-03-30T08:00:00.000-07:00

Perfect solution for family devotions Jim Burns relies on decades of curriculum and devotional writing to produce a fantastic resource for parents. Quality family time is a rare commodity in our fast-paced modern culture these days, but this book could really help slow life down in a fun way. The layout of the book sets up the leader for great success. The Key Verse and Big Idea sections keep

Half Time Kids = Full Time Work

2011-03-03T10:30:00.000-08:00

The plague of modern society: Most folks are only 50% committed to anything. RSVPs mean absolutely nothing. Returning emails, getting a 'like' from a Facebook post, a one year commitment to volunteer, and showing up most of the time to church or Sunday school is relegated to "Leave It To Beaver land". Its somewhere in another time period and not anymore. How many of us in church ministry lament

Tale of Two Bibles: Best Study Bible ever.

2011-03-02T05:37:00.000-08:00

Being a brand new Christian and walking into a strange new world, the Christian Bookstore, looking for a new bible can be pretty overwhelming. I was thankful to even find a good store in Cookeville, TN in 1986 but I did. Cornerstone Christian Bookstore came to my aide. (Store location) I was directed to the Thompson Chain Reference Bible (1983 edition when it was still in partnership with

Turning over the keys to a new driver = FEAR

2011-03-01T04:11:00.000-08:00

A challenging book about parenting that introduces some new ideas. Having something new and fresh to say about a topic that already has a million books shelved and a billion opinions expressed is tough to accomplish. The Stadtmillers may have pulled it off in Give Your Kids The Keys. While I certainly don't agree with all of their theology, especially their hearing God's voice beliefs, I was more

The cancer and poison of unconfessed sin

2011-02-10T04:39:00.000-08:00

The cancer and poison of unconfessed sin Psalm 323 When I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. 4 For day and night your hand was heavy upon me; my strength was sapped as in the heat of summer. 9 Do not be like the horse or the mule, which have no understanding but must be controlled by bit and bridle or they will not come to you.

Hey, don't feel bad, nobody told me either!

2011-02-01T07:21:00.000-08:00

Well, this book was sure an eye-opener. "Nobody told me either!" is what I kept catching myself thinking as I read this book. Oh sure I had most of the biology of sex and relationships down by late high school but the emotional and spiritual scars of fornication and adultery are still so shocking and sobering to hear. This is a great book. This is a book I will have each of my own children read

You are a slave!

2011-01-31T06:20:00.000-08:00

You are a slave! Many people in modern America don't like to think about slavery, much less being a slave. I mean the last slave in America was in the 1860s right? Wrong! Everyone you see today is still a slave, either a slave of sin or a slave of Christ. Dr. MacArthur helps us unlock a word and certainly the divine, wonderful truth of the word in Greek, doulos, or slave. Lost in translation in

What is the Gospel? (And what it is NOT.)

2011-01-25T17:38:00.000-08:00

I am pleased with this book. Simple to understand, great illustrations and a very clear, biblical presentation of the four essential points of the Gospel. I'll give you one hint: "God loves and has a wonderful plan for your life." is NOT one of the four and it NEVER was. I was deceived for almost 10 years with that one. Gilbert breaks the Gospel down into the four key points of a proper,

Best Bible Highlighter

2011-01-14T07:55:00.001-08:00

Originally submitted at AllBibles.com My choice of Bible highlighter By Steelsmitty from Brentwood, TN on 1/14/20115out of 5Pros: Color Choices, No bleed through, Easy and quick, Bible page friendly Best Uses: Devotions, Scripture memory, Sermons, Any highlighting needs I've been consistently using the SAME Pentel Highlighter since the early 90s and it has NOT broken! Lead refills are easy to

A Wide margin Bible but print is too small

2011-01-14T07:48:00.001-08:00

Originally submitted at AllBibles.com Wide margin but small print By Steelsmitty from Brentwood, TN on 1/14/20112out of 5Pros: Wide margin for notes, Solidly Built, Excellent translation Cons: Poor font size Best Uses: Students, Devotional notes, Daily journal, Younger eyes, Sermon notes An outstanding choice for sermon note taking or devotional notes.The print is so small that only those with

Big Questions need Big Answers from the Bible

2011-01-06T15:06:00.000-08:00

Impressive 13 lessons for ages 3 to 12 In Big Wave Discovery, Gospel Light creates a resource that interested me the moment I heard about the apologetics flavor it had. The 13 big questions really are questions that I've had kids ask me, and yes, even adults. Is God for real? Why do bad things happen? Is Jesus the only way to God? These questions really rattle the cage of our existence and the

Big Books rescue big ministry problems

2011-01-05T09:09:00.000-08:00

Big Book of message rescue This book has rescued my on several occasions this AWANA TNT year already. Looking back I should have just picked 30 or so of the 52 available lessons on discipleship and had that as the basis of the teaching year. I love the simple format, the opening topic intro games or activities. The lesson content is solid and its indexed perfectly for quick finds by topic

Tozer's Totally Tweetable

2010-12-29T07:44:00.000-08:00

A.W. Tozer's wordsmithing, theology and penetrating barbs into modern culture are still as relevant today as they were 50 to 80 years ago when he was alive and writing. Every time I read this book I shocked into repentance of my shallow slavery commitments to Christ and just scratch my head as he continues to peg our culture long after his death. It seems that every other sentence that Tozer

Are you comfortable in your own shoes?

2010-12-26T11:51:00.000-08:00

Are you comfortable in your own preaching shoes? In Well-Driven Nails, my pastor, Byron Yawn, explains the strange event that all of us know as the sermon. Everyone has heard a sermon and many picking up this book have preached or are about to preach a sermon real soon. Ok, so why should a preacher or teacher invest in this book. First, its a fairly unique approach to the subject. Finding your

A book worth reading that has a solid Biblical core

2010-12-20T05:24:00.000-08:00

Larry Fowler encourages me every time I listen to him or shake his hand. In Rock Solid Volunteers he wonderfully draws truth, encouragement and easy principles from the evidence from Nehemiah. I loved this book because it was straight from the Bible. I have read and studied Nehemiah's leadership and planning principles many times and yet Larry taught me several things that I just flat our missed

Tried and True curriculum evaluation questions

2010-10-21T14:13:00.000-07:00

There is a growing number of children's Sunday School curriculum options in the market today due to the ease of the internet and digital production capabilities of your average computer savvy church worker or leader. I was digging through some old Gospel Light resource books and dusted off this old resource and Surprise! Surprise! The content is just as important today as it was first written

Family Devotions in a personal and unique style

2010-10-04T06:07:00.000-07:00

Our family has kept a tradition for years of reading to our children devotional books or any quality classic for that matter. We have been through the Bible in various forms, Narnia, Little House on the Prairie and countless other books over the last 18 years. This devotional is different than all the others. One simple, yet profound twist in the writing style makes this one interesting and

Church + Home is the ideal combination for growing Christian faith

2010-09-27T03:01:00.000-07:00

Mark Holmen of Faith@Home Ministry writes from personal experience as a Faith@Home dad and a Faith@Home pastor on how to build lifelong faith at home. The book is a very quick read filled with personal testimonies as well as other voices from all over the country. I think Mark gets it right when he encourages church leaders to weave home directed faith throughout the church programming instead of

Intelligent Design needs better designed books

2010-09-21T03:25:00.000-07:00

I was handed this book as a gift from the Answers In Genesis booth at a recent Munce show in Murfreesboro, TN. I rarely, if ever read novels but since it was a gift and had an interesting story line I thought I would give it a go. I will admit up front that I blew through this book quickly on a recent air travel business trip. Even after knowing exactly how it was going to end when I was about 50

The Church should be allergic to the world

2010-09-21T02:28:00.000-07:00

Tozer connects another lethal blow to man's self-centered sufficiency in this newly discovered, unpublished work. 47 years after his death, Tozer is still absolutely critical for the modern church to take heed. Tozer's lifelong message of battling entertainment in the church and an insidious form of Christless mysticism still rings truer than ever. Listen to Tozer in his own words: "The average

Star Parker, female Uncle Tom

2010-09-14T16:57:00.000-07:00