Written by: April J. Buchanan She, who was made in His image, was born in sin and became worthless. She stood justly condemned. Yet He, who is righteous and holy, takes what is worthless and makes it beautiful. He removes her heart of stone and gives her a heart of flesh. He puts His Spirit…

Written by: April J. Buchanan The problem with the belief that fallen man possesses free will is that it assumes something inherently good remains in him by which he may reach out to God apart from God’s sovereign work in salvation. It assumes that man is capable of contributing to his salvation by means of…

Written by: April J. Buchanan The problem with hearing words that strike fear into your heart and urge you to flee now to Christ because tomorrow you may die is this: when tomorrow comes and you wake again, you convince yourself you have overcome that fear. You begin to call it irrational. You comfort yourself…

Written by: April J. Buchanan I could breathe. When, by God’s grace, you finally stop resisting the testing of your beliefs against Scripture, because if you are honest you are afraid they may very well be proven wrong, and you allow Scripture to confirm or destroy what you believe, it will either result in greater…

Written by: April J. Buchanan A love that grows must have boundaries. Boundaries do not suffocate love. They protect it. They define it. They nourish it and guard it from all that would corrupt, distort, or destroy it. The world labors to erase the very boundaries that protect love while insisting that love cannot thrive…

Written by: April J. Buchanan Every season carries beauty in the ordinary affairs of life. Some of that beauty is nearly impossible to see in the moment and can only be appreciated as time relentlessly marches on. And what once felt so beautiful often cannot compare to what lies ahead. Still, today is what we…

Written by: April J. Buchanan John 10 speaks of Christ’s sheep hearing His voice. That much is abundantly clear. What is not present in the text is the modern idea that believers should be hearing new, personal, private words from Jesus. That meaning is imported into the passage, and when it is, the text is…

Written by: April J. Buchanan Yes. That verse says those words. But what you are doing with them is vile, reprehensible, and not merely an offense against Christians, but an offense against a holy God. You have your bias, and your heart is hard-set against Christians. You claim to be one of them. You claim…

Written by: April J. Buchanan When we teach that someone needs to rededicate their life to the Lord, we diminish the power of the Gospel, deny the finality of Christ’s finished work, and obscure the ongoing work of grace in those who are truly born again. If someone makes a profession of faith, walks an…

Written by: April J. Buchanan There’s something about romanticizing and spiritualizing one’s testimony. It almost becomes this thing that sets you apart as more spiritual because you’ve been through more “stuff” than others so now where you are is because of what you’ve been through and you have been granted something greater for which you…