Jason Isbell on Fresh Air

The more listens I give to Jason Isbell's remarkable album, Southeastern, the more I love it.

I point you to a lot of music and most of the time I blog on albums when they are on sale. Finding a good album for $5 or cheaper is joy. Southeastern is full price. It's $9.99. And it's worth three times the price. If you wait and spend your money only when albums are on sale, you will miss something remarkable. 

I submit into evidence Jason Isbell's recent appearance on NPR's Fresh Air podcast. Isbell plays a few of his songs live and talks about his own struggles with addiction. It's a great interview. And every song on this album makes me think. I hope you'll check it out.

TGC Podcast: "Precious Puritans" & Much More

The Gospel Coalition has a new podcast, "Going Deeper with TGC." Collin Hansen writes...

The Gospel Coalition's new podcast, "Going Deeper with TGC," has two goals:

1. We want to follow up on the most widely read, controversial, helpful, insightful resources produced by our council members, writers, editors, and bloggers.
2. We want to serve you by using a different medium, audio, to provide the same quality of gospel-centered content we publish in blogs, essays, and reviews.

We've assembled an experienced team to produce this podcast, which we aim to record at least every two weeks. I'm joined each time by my co-host, Mark Mellinger, the gifted news anchor of WANE-TV in Fort Wayne, Indiana.

An excellent idea for a podcast, and I'm thankful for this new resource. I've subscribed. In this inaugural podcast there are discussions with Thabiti Anyabwile on same-sex marriage & the Puritans, among other things. We also hear from Jared Wilson & Trevin Wax on The Gospel Project. Listen here.

Michael Frost | Romancing Your City

It sounded like a cheesy title, but Michael Frost (Exiles, The Shaping of Things to Come, ReJesus, The Road to Missional) delivered a simple, thought-provoking breakout at Exponential 2012 that I listened to by podcast last night. He compares a good marriage to how we say "I do" and "To death do us part" and the ongoing romance with our spouse with how a church loves her neighborhood (or city). I'd have some minor quibbles, but it was quite helpful for me.

Here are some of his thoughts and points from my sketchy notes, which you can see are comparable to marriage. Should we commit to our neighborhoods (cities) to a lifelong romance, till death do we part? Good thoughts here...

• Move in to the neighborhood God has sent you to
• Listen to your neighborhood

• Talk to your mayor, police chief, fire chief, school principals
• Eat in local restaurants, get in local cafes, walk the neighborhood
• Ask people what they want, long for, desire
• NOTE: Interesting section on midnight-5am "street pastors" 16:45 mark
• "Listen to your neighborhood, it is telling you--if you listen hard enough--how to evangelize them, how to serve them, how to unleash an awareness of the reign of God in that place."

• Partner with your neighborhood
• Stay for a long time in your neighborhood (sickness or health, rich or poor, till death do we part)

• You will move culture to a tipping point by transforming hundreds of thousands of villages across the nation.
• If this place goes down, we will go down with you.

Francis Schaeffer & L'Abri

Over the last couple of weeks I've been enjoying working out with Jerram Barrs audio from his two classes on Francis Schaeffer (Early Years & Later Years) at Covenant Seminary. Specifically, I've been listening by streaming through the Covenant Seminary Worldwide Classroom app on my Android phone.

I've thought for several years that one of the best things that could happen in American churches is that we would take a more L'Abri-like approach to our mission. You can read the Schaeffer's ministry at L'Abri in The Tapestry (out of print, but I just picked one up used but in perfect condition for $25) and L'Abri. I think churches like Soma Communities are doing this kind of thing better than most.

Whether or not you pick up the books, please go pick up these very helpful, free audio classes from Jerram Barrs are hard to beat as resources in thinking about mission, apologetics, living missionally, hospitality, etc. Download Francis Schaeffer: The Early Years and Francis Schaeffer: The Later Years now. You can get them through iTunes, or stream them over the Worldwide Classroom. While you are at it, find more great stuff from Jerram Barrs including his books The Heart of Evangelism and Learning Evangelism From Jesus.

Beeke: Sibbes on Entertaining the Holy Spirit

Recently was encouraged by Joel Beeke's talk on Richard Sibbes on Entertaining the Holy Spirit in your own soul via the Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary podcast. He gives some historical context of Sibbes' life and offers some wonderful quotes and exhortations.

Grab the podcast feed for numerous other encouraging talks from Beeke, David Murray and others. One of my favorite podcasts going.

Joe Thorn on White Horse Inn

My buddy, Joe Thorn, was interviewed by Michael Horton on my favorite Christian podcast, The White Horse Inn. The topic was preaching to yourself & Joe's book Note to Self. From Joe's blog...

Over 17 years ago I started listening to The White Horse Inn radio program. In fact, while in college a group of students would cram into a dorm room and listen to Mike Horton, Rod Rosenbladt, Ken Jones, and Kim Riddlebarger talk through theology, Scripture, evangelical culture, and church life. We felt like theoloigcal insurgents at our Bible College, but we were really just theology nerds. The WHI is still one of the most valuable things I listen to, now as a podcast, so I was humbled and excited to get an invitation to talk to Mike Horton about my book, Note to Self. You can check out our conversation at the WHI website...

If you aren’t listening to the show, you need to make it a regular part of your diet. You have enough sermons, and broadly cultural podcasts streaming into your ipod, but there isn’t much else out there like this. And, while you’re adjusting your theoloigcal intake you should also subscribe to Modern Reformation magazine. Seriously, get on that. As a subscriber you have online access to all the back issues.

It's a great interview. Great job, Joe! And you should get the podcast. I never miss an episode.

Don't Miss The Art You Missed

Was pointed to a new podcast that I am thoroughly enjoying. It's called The Art You Missed. From the website...

The Art You Missed explores, freely and with an open mind, acts of creation that are in danger of being overlooked amidst the ever-widening stream of the world’s new art... 

The Art You Missed embraces the artistic impulse and adds this premise: all art is forever new...

The Art You Missed is not merely an academic or historical exercise, but is rather an active meditation on the permanent revolutionary impulse at the core of art...

The hosts, Samuel Melden and Fritz Byers, talk music, poetry, and various other kinds of art. 

If you like the podcast, and I think you will, check out their Kickstarter Campaign. Also follow and "like" them out on Twitter and Facebook.

Tim Keller on Preaching to Himself

Tim Keller, at about 7 minutes in to the 2nd Q&A session with Bryan Chapell (from these discussions), is basically asked, How do you ["preach the gospel to yourself every day"]? I worked hard to do justice to how Keller stated these things. Hope it's helpful.

I try to do petition in the morning. I try to do repentance in the evening. So I try to pray in the morning and in the evening. In the evening I look back on what I did wrong and repent. 

But in the middle of the day I try to catch myself and I look for four kinds of emotions. 

I always pray in the morning, "Lord make me happy enough in the grace of Jesus to avoid being proud, cold, scared, and hooked."

• Now, by proud I mean what you think, too self-congratulatory. And maybe disdainful of people who I don't think have it together.
• Cold means I'm just too absorbed in my concerns to really be compassionate and gracious and warm and joyful to the people around me. 
• Scared means I'm just obviously too anxious and worried.
• Hooked means...when you're overworked, it means for me...eating. Eating things I shouldn't eat just because it's a way of keeping my energy up, and also because it's a way of rewarding myself. Or looking at women more than once.

So: proud, cold, scared, hooked.

Now, in the middle of the day I get it out and say, "Have I been proud, scared, cold, or hooked in the last 3-4 hours. And the answer usually is "Yeah." And then I say, "How do I bring the Gospel to bear on that? How does the grace of God deal with it?" And you try to catch yourself in those feelings. So basically finding problem feelings and inordinate desires, catch them when they're happening, try to deal with them with the Gospel right there.

I call that "Quick Strike" on my idols around noon, if I can remember it. And repentance at night and petition in the morning. So I try to get into God's presence three times a day.

[...]

I know the times in which I've been most prone to temptation is when I've basically drop-kicked the whole practice, the discipline of it, for weeks on end because I've just been so busy and running ragged and that's when I can really sense myself being vulnerable.

Bryan Chapell Discussion with Tim Keller

Tim Keller was at Covenant Seminary and had a discussion with his friend and Covenant President Bryan Chapell (podcasted in December of 2010). Bryan Chapell led a two part discussion with him followed by a two part question & answer time.

The heart of the conversation was Counterfeit Gods, but tons of other rich, helpful stuff. We get stuff from Keller's prayer life, to the three year revival at Redeemer (according to Jonathan Edwards' standards), to the difficulties and blessings of 9/11 at Redeemer, to his thoughts on how getting "fame" as a pastor late in life has impacted Redeemer and their future and the push for leadership development, to how he prepares sermons, and bunches more. So good.

MP3's are below (original source). Or do as I did: go subscribe to Living Christ Today podcast and find the episodes from December. Tons of other great stuff there from Chapell and others. 

Click to listen, right click to download...

Discussion 1 | Discussion 2 || Q&A 1 | Q&A 2

NPM: Billy Collins Interview

Listen to this interview of Billy Collins by Christy Tennant of International Arts Mission (IAM). You should subscribe to the IAM podcast. One of the best things on the arts from a perspective of faith out there.

Also check out the most touching Billy Collins poem (to me) "The Lanyard." It's something I like to point to each April in remembrance of my Mom, who died of cancer in April of 2007.