I’m excited about our new daily devotional, A Daily Word. I have written these 366 devotions with the purpose of encouraging God’s people through His Word.

We all need encouragement—on a daily basis, and the only source of unfailing, always-available encouragement is God’s Word. Psalm 68:19 declares, “Blessed be the Lord, who daily loadeth us with benefits, even the God of our salvation. Selah.” God daily loads our lives with so many benefits, but the greatest of these is the truth, nourishment, strength, and encouragement He gives through His Word. “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness” (2 Timothy 2:16).

Each of the devotions in A Daily Word are based on Scripture that will encourage, challenge, and strengthen Christians in their walk with the Lord. I’m thrilled to be able to offer this resource that will encourage God’s people through His incredible Word.

Over the past several months, the Lord allowed me to partner with Brother Clayton Reed on one of the most thrilling projects I’ve been able to work on. Church Still Works details the results of a thorough nationwide survey of independent Baptist churches for an unbiased perspective of our growth and spiritual health.

It was encouraging to see that, even during a time when many denominations are losing members, our churches are actually growing! From the survey, we examined what specific practices growing churches follow that we might all benefit. Not surprisingly, the seven practices we found are the same practices given throughout Acts and the New Testament epistles.

The most exciting and challenging aspect brought out in this survey is the potential of even greater growth if we will continue to strive together in planting new churches at home and around the world. We can make a difference in a world that is turning from God, but to do so, we must labor together to plant more local churches in more places.

I am thrilled for this resource to be available. This book will encourage and strengthen independent Baptist pastors and churches to fulfill the Great Commission. View a video interview, reviews, and a sample chapter at churchstillworks.com.

Several years ago, Dr. Rod Bell, then the president of the Fundamental Baptist Fellowship, gave me a copy of the book entitled The Integrity Crisis.  I read this book again this summer and was greatly encouraged and helped by its contents.

Wiersbe speaks of the reproach that is facing Christianity today and says, “The church has grown accustomed to hearing people question the message of the Gospel because the message is foolishness to the lost, but today, the situation is embarrassingly reversed, for now the messenger is suspect.”  The book is a call to God’s servants to live with integrity.  In order to do this, Wiersbe states that we must avoid the rebellion that leads so many down the wrong pathway of leadership.  He challenges the read to move past the tendency to simply copy what others are doing and become enamored with the entertainment philosophies of the world.  Rather he admonishes us to serve the Lord from true hearts of worship.  Wiersbe warns that the pop Gospel of success will try to make us believe that God’s greatest concern is to make us happy, rather than to make us spiritual and holy.  In these days of “letting the good times roll” many have stopped using the Word of God in the pulpit.  Happiness, he claims, is only the by-product of being right with God.

In the chapter entitled “Reproof,” Wiersbe states his belief that some Christian celebrities have found themselves falling into sin because they believe what people stated about them.

It is so important to deflect all praise and honor to the Lord Jesus Christ.  Wiersbe also touched on the problem of anti-nomianism, which I fear is plaguing many churches and colleges today.  He says, “In our desire to escape ‘legalism’ I fear we have embraced a subtle form of anti-nomianism with results that would have driven our fathers to their knees in prayer; treating the marriage covenant lightly, adopting the lifestyle of the rich and famous, using the world’s approach in merchandising the Gospel, ignoring the Lord’s day, refusing to enforce standards, and even watering down our preaching so people won’t be offended.”

Wiersbe closes the book pleading for revival and asking God’s people to repent.  He quotes Psalm 85:6—Wilt thou not revive us again: that thy people may rejoice in thee?  Wiersbe says, “In the final analysis we don’t change things by reading books and agreeing with one another.  We change things by making ourselves available to God and obeying Him so He can work through us.”  How true!

by R. Kent Hughes
published by Crossway Publishing

The existence and influence of the seeker-sensitive movement upon the American church is now no secret. For some twenty years, church growth experts have called upon pastors to amend and change the traditional worship styles and preaching dynamic, in order to “relate better to people.”

In my book The Saviour Sensitive Church I outline many of the weaknesses of the seeker-sensitive movement. One evidence of the failure of this movement is the fact that a lower percentage of people attend church in America today than ever. Those who do attend church are often unable to distinguish biblical principles, much less apply them to their lives.

It is always interesting to me when an author writes a book speaking to the issue of the lack of separation in the contemporary church. But I am specifically interested when the author primarily fellowships with those who are involved in the contemporary church movement.

The book written by Oz Guinness entitled Prophetic Untimeliness was unique in that it was a call from within, challenging the “evangelicals” to return to the fire and seperatistic stand of the reformation.

The book Set Apart by R. Kent Hughes is similar in its philosophy. In fact, Hughes says in the introduction of the book, “The contemporary evangelical church is not lacking for moral and spiritual instruction. It is lacking in his ability to remain uncontaminated by the unchristian thinking and morality of contemporary culture.” Hughes, then, begins to show how the contemporary church has been influenced by the philosophies of today’s society. Those philosophies include materialism, hedonism, viewing sensuality, pluralism, and even modesty!

In a sense, it was refreshing for me, as an independent fundamental Baptist, to hear someone from without our circle speaking against the influence of companies such as Victoria’s Secret or Abercrombie and Fitch on our nation and upon Christians today.

I highly recommend Set Apart as a book that will help pastors, parents, and educators identify some of the leading challenges against the church. In addition, the author gives good scriptural reference for combating the onslaught of wickedness in the day in which we live.

Over the last several months I have spent a good amount of time in the evening and early morning hours working on my new book entitled The Spiritual Leader.

The Spiritual Leader is a guidebook for pastors and Christian leaders as they lead God’s people. There are six sections to this book:

The Spiritual Leader’s Heart
The Spiritual Leader’s Ministry
The Spiritual Leader’s Pulpit
The Spiritual Leader’s Team
The Spiritual Leader’s Trials
The Spiritual Leader’s Triumphs

In many ways, this book is the culmination of the principles God has taught me through His Word, through years of reading, and through years of leading. It is my earnest prayer that God will use this book to be of help in the lives of the leaders here at Lancaster Baptist Church, West Coast Baptist College and, should He allow, throughout our country.

Here are a few chapter titles to show you the direction of the book:

The Spirit-filled Leader
The Servant Leader
The Spiritual Leader’s Friends
The Spiritual Leader’s Priorities
The Overseeing Leader
The Administrative Leader
Leading Through Different Stages of Growth
Overcoming Barriers in Ministry
Leading a Biblical Church Service
The Spiritual Leader’s Music Ministry
The Spiritual Leader and His Wife
The Spiritual Leader and His Children
The Spiritual Leader’s Staff
The Spiritual Leader’s Motivator
Leading Through Crises
Leading by Intervening
And many more…

Spiritual leadership is a life-long journey and all of us, to some extent, have the privilege of leading and influencing others for good and for God. We will formally introduce the book at this year’s Spiritual Leadership Conference and we are taking early orders through our website at www.strivingtogether.com.

Please pray that God will bless this book and that it will be used to encourage others for His glory!