Andrew Peterson: My Love Has Gone Across the Sea

Andrew Peterson’s The Monster in the Hollows has this lovely lyric embedded within the wider story: My love has gone across the sea To find a country far and fair He sailed into the gilded west And lo, my heart will never rest Until my love returns to me Or I set out to find him there. …

The World Is Whispering

This poem comes at the moving conclusion of Andrew Peterson’s fourth and final book in the Wingfeather Saga, The Warden and the Wolf King: The world is whispering–listen child!– The world is telling a tale. When the seafoam froths in the water wild Or the fendril flies in the gale, When the sky is mad with the …

“The Legend of the Sunken Mountains” by Andrew Peterson

We’re fans around here of Andrew Peterson’s Wingfeather Saga, and in the run-up to the real release of Book Four, The Warden and the Wolf King, we are reading back over the first three volumes. We just finished volume one, On the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness, which includes this poem, “The Legend of the …

In Sorrows Dust and Ash

For Liam’s Parents at His Funeral January 15, 2013 O LORD, our Lord, majestic name, We sit in dust and ash. Though sorrows all around us crash, Rejoicing all the same. We know not why this little one Is laid to rest today. He brought us joy, though not yet born, We know not how …

We Watch Every Year, by Spencer Haygood

Spencer Haygood shared this Dr. Seuss style poem with me for the Christmas season. I loved it, and he gave me permission to post it here. Enjoy! We Watch Every Year! B. Spencer Haygood, Jr   We all know the story, we’ve all heard it told, of the Who’s down in Whoville, and the Grinch, …

Because He Gave His Son

We transgressed, defiled and raged, And he gave his son. For our filth and shame, staining sin, He sent the pure one. Bloodied hands and bloodsoaked lands, The Lamb—he held his tongue, His blood was spilt; the church was built, Because he gave his son. Now free from chains and all your pains To living …

Beowulf as Christian Apologetic

Douglas Wilson has translated Beowulf, and a few years back he wrote an essay for Touchstone on it: “The Anglo-Saxon Evangel: The Beowulf Poet Was a Shrewd Christian Apologist.” Though a heroic poem about pagans that never mentions Christ, Beowulf is the opposite of syncretistic compromise. It is written to highlight the treachery as a way of life that …

How To Use “The Bible’s Big Story”: Dads, Step Up and Play the Man

Do you know what I’m trying to accomplish with The Bible’s Big Story? I want you to win the hearts of your children. I want you to win them through the time you spend with them. I want you to start when they’re so small they can’t yet climb off your lap and crawl around. I …

Paris Review Interview with Shelby Foote

Deeply enjoyed this long interview in Paris Review with Shelby Foote (HT: JT). Here are a few snippets. Advice for young writers: To read, and above all to reread. When you read, you get the great pleasure of discovering what happened. When you reread, you get the great pleasure of knowing where the author’s going …

Hopeful Indications in Derek Webb’s “Everything Will Change”

I’m hearing good things from people I trust about the direction of Derek Webb’s new album. Scott Corbin pointed me to one of the new songs on YouTube, “Everything Will Change.” It’s encouraging that this song locates the resolution to the world’s ills not in some social-engineering project of a political party but in the …

Derek Webb’s Failed Confession

Collin Garbarino posted a new video from Derek Webb, in which Derek “confesses”: “I was wrong, I’m sorry, and I love you.” My problem with this song is that Derek doesn’t specify what it is he thinks he was wrong about. There are some things I think he has been wrong about, but those may …

Biblical Theology in a Children’s Book? Introducing the Bible’s Big Story

I remember the first time someone presented to me, all at one shot, an overview of the Bible’s big story. It was in the famous Bible Study Methods and Hermeneutics class taught by Howard Hendricks and Mark Bailey at Dallas Seminary. That overview was so exciting to me I thought all Christians should go to …

Lepanto by G. K. Chesterton

Savor the power of the language in this stanza from G. K. Chesterton’s tribute to the Battle of Lepanto: Dim drums throbbing, in the hills half heard, Where only on a nameless throne a crownless prince has stirred, Where, risen from a doubtful seat and half attainted stall, The last knight of Europe takes weapons …

“A City Radiant as a Bride,” by Timothy Dudley-Smith

Revelation 21:9–11, “Then came one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls full of the seven last plagues and spoke to me, saying, ‘Come, I will show you the Bride, the wife of the Lamb.’ And he carried me away in the Spirit to a great, high mountain, and showed me the holy …

As Deserts Are with Sands

Set in vast realms of space Across an untold time The sprawling story he creates, Sings the song sublime. The music pure made matter hard, The words became the real. What is was built by his mere word, The worlds the words do feel. A garden sprang up from the song, Replete with sacred tree, …

The Best Sermon I’ve Ever Heard on Marriage

Denny Burk preached the best sermon I’ve ever heard on marriage at Kenwood Baptist Church this morning. It was prophetic, powerful, piercing, and poetic. Denny’s introduction was prophetic: We all found out last month what the President of the United States thinks about marriage. He sat down for an interview with ABC News and announced …