Tinkering with the grace of God brings great offense to the Almighty. Some of history’s godliest giants at first disdained the Lord’s free gift of salvation, at times nibbling around the edges, seeking to yield only partial allegiance to Christ.
John Bunyan did not convert to Christ in a moment, nor was it an easy journey to the Celestial City. But when he finally saw that grace alone could wash away his sins, he took his place as one of the greatest preachers and writers the world has ever seen.
Orators in imagery uses word pictures to explain, entertain, and delight. A gifted speakers doesn’t say, “I help people see clearly.” He says, “I am the light of the world.” He doesn’t say, “Fist fights get out of hand quickly.” He says, “A quarrel is like opening a floodgate.” He doesn’t say, “Chasing a wicked woman will get you in trouble.” He says, “Pursuing a harlot is like an ox going to slaughter.”
Jeremiah described rebellious Israel as a donkey sniffing the wind (Jer. 2:24). David said God’s words are sweeter than the prized drippings of a honeycomb (Ps. 19:10). King Solomon compared a scoundrel’s words to a runaway forest fire (Pr. 16:27) and a king’s anger to a lion’s roar (Pr. 20:2). These metaphors and hundreds more in Scripture help people understand the nature of God, the depths of their sin, the purpose of life, and the grandeur of Jesus.
Jesus was the master at imagery, using robbers, crops, weddings, spices, animals, coins and kings to explain the truth. In church history, one of the giants of word pictures was Thomas Watson, who learned that while he preached from the Bible, he could also paint with his words.
The Bible emphasizes doing tasks completely, heartily, and with all one’s might. John Owen, the great theologian of the Puritan movement, never did his work by halves but embraced the kind of thoroughness Colossians 3:23 promotes: “Work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men.”
Whether it was writing catechisms for children, penning theological treatises, or preaching before Parliament, Owen worked with all his might.
Visit the market town of Kidderminster in Worcestershire, England today and you’ll notice a statue of a man preaching, his right hand pointing upward and his left hand holding a book. This monument of Richard Baxter, the 17th century nonconformist minister, captures the three items he loved most: Heaven, preaching, and books—ultimately the greatest book of Scripture.
Gifted with a tenacious memory and an incomparable work ethic, Richard Baxter stands as the most prolific English theological writer of all time. A study of his life will illustrate an excellent model of Christians studiousness to the glory of God.
The organisation known as Black Lives Matter (BLM) is a violent, dangerous, Marxist movement. It is fiction, a sham, and a lie to believe that BLM really cares about black lives. Consider just two examples to support this claim: BLM’s outspoken support of abortion in the US and their deafening silence concerning the murder of black Christians around the world.
According to the recently released quarterly labour force survey, South African unemployment stands at a staggering 33%. Using the expanded definition (i.e., including those who have abandoned their search for employment due to discouragement), the rate is 43%. Nearly 1 in every 2 people looking for a job cannot find one (for the 33% and the 43%).
Recently, a man from South Africa named Joshua Mhlakela predicted that the rapture of the church would occur between September 23-24 of this year. He made this claim after supposedly receiving a vision about Christ’s return. In his TV interview, which has since received hundreds of thousands of views, Mhlakela claimed to be a “billion per cent sure” the Lord would return on those dates, though the dates continue to change. South African singer-turned preacher Danie Botha made a similar false claim about the Lord’s return.
Mark it down as another win for feminism after South Africa’s highest courts recently ruled that a husband can legally take the surname of his wife, overturning a law that once barred them from doing so.
What has long been a common practice in Europe has now made its way to Africa, as the South African Constitutional Court decided that the previous law which only allowed male surnames in marriage, was a “colonial import” and did not promote gender equality. This came after both an Afrikaans and an English husband sued for not being allowed to take their respective wives’ surnames.
Scroll through the BBC’s Africa home page and you’ll find a cesspool of articles promoting violent women’s sports. A cage fighter from Nigeria poses for the camera, her fists up, growling: “I am the queen of the cage.” A video promotes women’s arm wrestling by displaying two ladies with arms the size of #2 pencils—one shrew-sized participant straining for victory while wearing a burka.
Another article promotes a woman named Peace for becoming the first Ugandan national to sign for a women’s super league rugby squad. Is this wholesome? Should Christians encourage their daughters to play lock and flanker on a rugby team? The implications of our answer go far beyond this one sport but to the very nature of men and women.
While the first 500 hundred years of the church enjoyed a plethora of famous preachers, theologians, pastors, and martyrs, the next half millennium did not produce nearly as many giants of the faith. But the gospel continued to advance from AD 500-1000—the first half of what is poorly entitled the “Dark Ages”.
The success in Christianity grew in part due to the missionary efforts of Patrick of Ireland, a godly former slave, missionary, and bishop that ignored the evil that was done to him in his youth by responding to his enemies with forgiveness and love. Today, he is known as the Apostle to the Irish.
Receiving services and material for free is a serious problem in Africa. For decades, foreign aid has flooded into Africa, though the continent remains the poorest in the world. NGOs grow in Africa like the frogs multiplied in Egypt. Shouldn’t someone shut off the tap and call the annual billions sent to Africa a colossal mistake? Not according to many, where politicians from South Africa still complain about the cutting of USAID, which accounted for 17% of South Africa’s health budget. Other African leaders insist on debt forgiveness.
What is a church?
Sadly, this mindset has trickled down to the church. Is it healthy that many African congregations are kept afloat through foreign donations? To answer this question, we must first define our terms. The local church is a body of believers that has covenanted together to preach God’s Word and administer baptism and the Lord’s Supper.
Gun-ownership in the United States is the highest in the world, with a rate of 120 guns per 100 people. Yes, that’s more than one gun per person. Gun-ownership rates in Africa, however, are tiny (at least among non-criminals), with almost non-existent rates in countries like Malawi, Benin, Ethiopia, and Niger.
In South Africa and South Sudan, there are less than ten gun-owners per one-hundred people, even though (as of 2024), South Africa has the fifth-highest crime rate in the world.
South Africa is a very dangerous place to live. According to recent crime statistics from the South African Police Service, 453 homes are burgled every day in the country. This despite each home being clothed in a robe of steel burglar bars and shiny razor wire.
This raises the question: are Christians allowed to defend themselves? If Jesus said to turn the other cheek, may His followers use dogs, walls, and fists to protect their lives and property? If so, are weapons like guns and knives valid? Consider the following four principles.
On Monday, July 14, shortly after 6 p.m., John MacArthur breathed his last breath on earth and was received into the presence of Jesus Christ, whom he loved and had preached faithfully for over six decades.
I enjoyed the privilege of studying under Dr. MacArthur at the Master’s Seminary and was honoured when he endorsed my first book. His influence reached around the world and will impact the church for centuries to come should the Lord tarry.
Having served for two decades as a missionary in Africa, I would like to highlight four ways John MacArthur influenced this continent for Christ.
Having lived in a little Tsonga village for nearly two decades, I’ve learned a thing or two about African culture. The place where I reside is semi-rural, and is thus a better representation of African culture than the westernised cities. Pit toilets are more common than flush toilets, the native language is more prevalent than English, granny-led homes are more numerous than houses with a mom and dad, and unemployment is sky-high.
One of my convictions is that feminism has devastated the African home perhaps more than any ideology—even more than the Prosperity Gospel.
These days, it seems the word “bigotry” could be applied to almost any behaviour. Criticise a Zulu’s English and you’ll be accused of racism. Complement that same Zulu’s English and you’ll be charged with implying that other Zulus can’t speak English well.
To be sure, Scripture is opposed to every form of prejudice, racism, and bigotry. But it is important to properly define these sinful behaviours. Favouritism is the unfair treatment of certain people. It refers to preferential actions toward one group over another for no good reason.
But does this mean we treat everyone the same? And isn’t it true that the world seems to call everything racism these days? How do I avoid jealousy of other groups unlike mine, and how do I navigate the idea of prejudice in a way that honours God?
The unemployment rate in South Africa stood at about 7% in the mid-1970s. It rose to 13% in the mid-90s, 25% in the late 2000s, and stands at about 33% as of the first quarter of 2025. In a recent survey of 24 developed countries, South Africa had by far the highest unemployment rate. Other worldwide surveys confirm that unemployment in South Africa is among the worst in the world.
While there are many solutions to unemployment, one obvious answer is removing Minimum Wage Laws (MWLs)—one of the greatest causes of a jobless society. An MWL is when the government makes it illegal to hire someone at a lesser rate than it has decreed.
Most nations around the world utilize minimum wage laws, which make it illegal for employers to pay less than the government-specified price for labor. Politicians and labor unions are notorious in their calls for higher minimum wage. These regulations, however, vary significantly.
The per-hour minimum wage in USD is about $19 in Luxembourg, $13 in Germany, $7.25 in the US, $2 in India, and $1.50 in South Africa. Some African countries are so poor (like Sudan, Burundi, and the Gambia) that monthly salaries work out to under $1 per day, or just a few cents per hour.
Miscarriages worldwide are quite common, occurring in nearly 20% of pregnancies. Most of the countries with the highest miscarriage rates are in Africa, such as Ethiopia, Niger, Mozambique, and Zambia. The majority of us know women who have experienced at least one miscarriage.
A miscarriage, sometimes called a spontaneous abortion, refers to the premature death of the baby in the womb. As opposed to abortion, which actively murders the child in the womb, a miscarriage is the end of a pregnancy before 20 weeks’ gestation. The death of a baby after 20 weeks is called a stillbirth, whereby the family often holds a funeral.
Who could be responsible for the majority of worldwide killings? The answer may surprise you.
Today’s greatest global holocaust comes not from Muslim fanatics against Christians, or gun-toting killers against their victims, or even abortion doctors against babies. The most common murders may come from mothers, sometimes Christians, against their own children through abortifacient birth control.
Some worldwide statistics say two out of every three teens leave the church after high school. In countries where Christianity is growing, parents are tempted to dismiss these numbers as not applicable to them. For example, among the twenty countries where Christianity is growing the most, seven are in Africa: Nigeria, Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, Ghana, Mozambique, and Tanzania.
Christians usually enjoy immense freedom of religion in places where Christianity is growing. While this is a blessing, freedom of religion can also be a detriment. Hypocrisy among Christians is much less common in countries where believers will be persecuted for following Christ.
For example, how many fake Christians do you think live in the Muslim areas of Uganda, where a Christian couple was recently poisoned by a Muslim woman? Or how about Burkina Faso, where Christians face attacks by militant Islamists? Then there is the Congo DRC, where a batch of seventy and then another forty-seven Christians were just recently murdered by devout Muslims.
The Black Tax has become such a pervasive issue in South Africa over the past several decades that books like Handle Black Tax Like a Prohave become a thing.
High earning blacks feel such a heavy duty to provide for lesser privileged family members that they often feel lost at sea as to how much and to whom they are bound to give. In this series we’ve observed pertinent biblical passages that address this issue.
The black tax refers to the money black Africans feel obligated to pay in order to support their parents and siblings. Zimbabwean Masimba Musodza says the black tax is “when one person is seen as having made it and is obligated to support all the less well-off relatives, no matter how distantly related.”
So ingrained is the black tax in African culture that to request absolution from such expectations is like asking a cat to bark. Pardon from the black tax is impossible and should a man ignore it, he best prepare himself to be bête noire.
These days, many Africans are feeling the pressure of the “black tax”, a colloquial term referring to the obligation of children to provide for their parents on a continual basis.
Poverty in Africa adds to the anxiety but sometimes wealth only makes the black tax worse. Some even call it an epidemic. The layers of difficulty are many, especially with first-generation Christians who feel torn about how to help unbelieving relatives, some of whom face financial difficulties of their own making.
Come Ye Children is a 160-page, 23 chapter booklet published in 1897 by Charles Spurgeon. The title is taken from Psalm 34:11, “Come, ye children, hearken unto me: I will teach you the fear of the Lord.”
In our age of infanticide and barrenness, and barrenness, where women bear children later in life or not at all, men sterilize themselves or urge the mother to murder the unborn child, Spurgeon’s affection for children is a fresh breeze across a generation of death.
We require all the teachers at our Christian school to read this little volume. Here are five reasons why.
A Puritan once said that some parents, like Eli, bring up their children, to bring down their house. In other words, some parents, like Eli, just don’t know how to parent and they pay the price.
Proverbs 10:1 says: “A wise son makes a glad father, but a foolish son is a sorrow to his mother.”
This got me thinking. Where are the best and worst places in the world to be a mom? Global Citizen says it’s Somalia because over 5% of the mothers die of maternal-related complications and 15% of the children don’t make it to their fifth birthday.
Pastor Paseka ‘Mboro’ of South Africa continues to fill the headlines. For years he’s drawn criticism for driving luxury vehicles in a poor neighborhood, claiming bizarre healing ability or, most recently, facing assault and kidnapping charges. But his run-ins with the law are far less concerning than his aberrant theology.
In a clip from Reggie Yates entitled “Extreme South Africa: The Missionary Preacher”, Mboro insists his parishioners bring underwear to church so that he may bless their “vuvuzelas” and “biscuits”, euphemisms for the male and female reproductive organs.
Mboro uses common prosperity tactics, in this case “points of contact”, in which the congregants’ undergarments serve as the conduit through which his supposed miraculous power will flow. Is this biblical?
Storms are brewing in the African church over homosexuality. The United Methodists in Africa now welcome LGBTQ+ members, though Methodists in countries like Ivory Coast and Zimbabwe have protested. The 2025 Cape Town Pride Parade expects another big turnout, even while the Anglican Church of Southern Africa has voted against blessing same-sex couples.
“UNNATURAL” IN ROMANS 1
Romans 1:26 uses the word “unnatural” to describe romantic, same-sex attraction because this desire contradicts the original condition. “Unnatural” means contrary to the factory settings God installed at birth, such as a person’s sex.
Nigeria is the deadliest place in the world to follow Jesus. Militant Muslims hunt Christians there the way a lion stalks a wounded gazelle.
According to the Open Doors Watch List, North Korea is the most dangerous place in the world for Christians, but Nigeria is the most deadly. In 2023, nearly 5,000 Christians were killed worldwide (that’s thirteen murdered a day) and 90% of these martyrdoms happened in Nigeria. More Christians are killed in Nigeria than all other nations combined, most often by Islamist jihadist groups like Boko Haram.
Every hour, over 300 people in Nigeria die. That’s five people every minute. This is more deaths per hour than any country in Africa and fourth highest in the world. China is first, at 1,300 deaths per hour, followed by India (over 1,000) and the U.S. (340).
The hundreds of Nigerians that pass into eternity every hour remind us of the brevity of life, as do life expectancy rates around the world, especially in Africa. Though numbers are on the rise compared to just a few decades ago, when life expectancy in Africa was 36 years old in 1950 (compared to 64 years old today), modern life expectancy is minuscule compared to the earth’s earliest days when Adam lived for 930 years and Methuselah died at 969. Enoch went to heaven as a young pup at age 365, but only because the Lord took him away before tasting death.
Christmas did not exist in Africa before Christianity reached its shores. Christianity did not exist in Africa before the missionaries brought it. Therefore, Africans have missionaries to thank for the Christmas holidays.
Christmas is the holiday in which Christians celebrate the birth of the Lord Jesus. Specifically, Christmas commemorates the incarnation, when God assumed human nature in the person of Christ. Unlike theophonies in the Old Testament, where Jesus appeared in human form temporarily, the incarnation was fixed and permanent, so that even today Jesus dwells in a glorified human body and maintains a human nature.
