AMAZING GRACE AT AMAZON: Amazon.com has put the 2007 theatrical release of “Amazing Grace” on sale. It was a great movie and a definitely worth checking out.

WHY STUDY CHURCH HISTORY? Tim Challies, author of The Discipline of Spiritual Discernment and one of the most disciplined bloggers out there, has come up with seven reasons why you should study church history.

WHAT BIBLICAL MANLINESS LOOKS LIKE: Phil Johnson over at Pyromaniacs lays it on the line when it comes to being a man:

Biblical manliness is about authentic character. It’s not about bravado, and it’s not about boyishness. Going out into the woods with a bunch of other men, putting on war paint, making animal noises, telling scary stories around a campfire, and then working up a good cry might be good, visceral fun and all, but that has nothing to do with the biblical idea of manliness.

Read the rest here.

WORSHIPING SUMMER: John Piper offers some good counsel about how not to let the pleasures of summer turn you from worshiping God instead:

Don’t let summer make your soul shrivel. God made summer as a foretaste of heaven, not a substitute. If the mailman brings you a love letter from your fiancé, don’t fall in love with the mailman. That’s what summer is: God’s messenger with a sun-soaked, tree-green, flower-blooming, lake-glistening letter of love to show us what he is planning for us in the age to come—“things which eye has not seen and ear has not heard, and which have not entered into the heart of man, God has prepared for those who love him” (1 Corinthians 2:9). Don’t fall in love with the video preview, and find yourself unable to love the coming reality.