The Small Branch

  Book Review - Strange New World by Carl Trueman This book has a lot of great information about how our culture got where it is and what we, as Christians, need to be looking out for.  Often, in our society, there is simple reaction and looking at the surface without really looking at the root causes.  Weeds have to be killed at the roots or they keep coming up.  This is true with plant weeds and idea weeds.  Carl Trueman helps us to see the roots of the ideas flourishing in our society today.  I would recommend this book for anyone concerned about the direction our culture is taking.  (I will also be assigning this book to my high school student.)

  I’m sure you’ve noticed the great divide in our country.   Culturally, and therefore politically, things seem to be spreading farther and farther apart.   I was thinking about this recently, especially while listening to The Briefing with Albert Mohler .   With a lot of political issues in the past, people have worked hard to come up with a bipartisan compromise.   Things like the budget and national debt, military presence and procedures, etc. have worked with compromises on both sides.   Why aren’t they doing that now?   Because there is no way to compromise on these issues.   Here are some examples: I believe that there are two genders, male and female, assigned at conception by the DNA God gives us.  If someone else wants to tell me that gender is something you can change or choose for yourself, I’m just going to tell them that they are wrong.  There is no room for compromise in either of our viewpoints.   Abortion is...

  121   (Biblical text in italics)   Compare this Psalm to Psalm 91 1 I will lift up my eyes to the mountains; From where shall my help come? 2 My help comes from Yahweh, Our help comes from the Lord through   His Word, His people (see Ecclesiastes 4:9-12, 2 Corinthians 1:10-11, and 1 Thessalonians 5:14), His Spirit, even His   arranging circumstances.  It does not always come in the form of a miraculous interventions.  Sometimes (often) we stay in the trial, but God gives   us what it takes to get to the other side of it.  God knows, better than we do, how these trials sanctify us and draw us closer to Him.  Who made heaven and earth.   The Lord is Creator and Sustainer (see Colossians 1:15-17) 3 He will not allow your foot to stumble; He who keeps you will not slumber.   This is unlike human guards who will fail because they must sleep. 4 Behold, He who keeps Israel Will not slumber and...

  Book Review - Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury This is one of those books that you often read in high school English, but for some reason, I was never assigned this particular one.  I missed out.  This is a great novel with a lot of insight.  Written in the 1950’s, there are a lot of ways which it has proven to be prophetic.  So many times, I found myself saying something like, “Yep, that is what is happening.”  The adventure is there, the action, the character development, overall a great story.  This is another one my high schooler will be reading.  I hope you will read it, too, and really think about the implications of human nature and culture.

  In the interest of full disclosure, if you look at 1st-12th grade, we homeschooled 1st-half of 7th, 1st-4th and 11th-12th, 1st-2nd and 9th-12th, and 7th-12th (this one is still in school with me with a couple of years left).   You may notice that these years don’t include a huge amount of middle school experience.   I will say that I also taught a middle school math class when I was teaching at a private school.   Anyway, I’ll still offer you a few thoughts about middle school. Ages 11-13 are what I would consider the logic stage, or the middle stage of classical education.  This is where you help your child to organize all the information they have been collecting so far.  This is also where you will probably veer away from the way things are being done in public schools (and most private ones).  This is because the American system of education has become more of Elementary School, Elementary School 2.0, and finally Elementary School 3.0. ...

  Why did God give us an imagination?   What are acceptable uses for imagination?   The dictionary says that imagination is the ability to form new ideas, images, and concepts without immediate input from our senses.   This seems like a good thing, and it is.   But where is the line?   Our imagination gives us the ability to imagine.   Basically, this gives us the ability to make up fiction as well as solve problems in novel ways.   Is fiction okay?   I think so.   There are obvious lines fiction can cross that takes us into sinful thinking, but we should be able to recognize that, right?   Sometimes we imagine things that aren’t fiction.   Like, when you read imagery in Revelation and picture it in your mind.   Is that imagination?   Maybe not, because you are getting input to your senses from the Word.   I guess my point is, my imagination can run wild in lots of different directions, some good, some not so g...

  This summer, some friends and I are looking at the Psalms of Ascent (Psalms 120-134; our packet uses the Legacy Standard Bible ).   This is the packet of study we are using - here . First, a few notes I made about worship to get started with these Psalms.  Worship is an act of homage or reverence to God; it is sinful to render worship to any created being (I got this from the BLB app).  We worship God because of who He is and what He has done.  We worship God by our obedience and submission to Him.  Worship involves praise, thanksgiving, and a true heart.  We worship Him in spirit and in truth (see John 4:23-24). Today, I’m going to share some of my notes for Psalm 120: 120 (Biblical text in italics) In my distress I called to Yahweh, (This is the first place we need to go when we are distress, straight to God.  Jeremiah shows us a great example of this with the book of Lamentations.  You can find a free mini-study from BSF on Je...