Barnabas Piper's Blog, page 59

New Happy Rant: Amazing Christmas Cards, New Years Goal Setting, and More

In this episode of The Happy Rant podcast Ted, Ronnie, and Barnabas suss out the following:

Listener submitted theologian names according to the game Ted created in the previous episode (name of the first street you lived on + last name of the author of the theology book nearest you + your last name)
Ronnie’s incredible Christmas poster, er, card
Other incredible Christmas cards
Do we make goals for the new year? If not, why not? If so, how?

Be sure to visit HappyRantPodcast.com where you can:

Order fresh roasted coffee from Lagares Roasters
Order your Happy Rant swag from Missional Wear (Use code RANT to get discounts on swag and/or shipping)

Please consider supporting the podcast financially as well. We have set up a Patreon page, and your donations help us cover production costs, do live events, and grow the podcast by trying some new things. Oh, and of course there are perks for those who commit to helps us such as free books and coffee!

To listen you can:

Subscribe in iTunes.
Listen on Google Play
Listen on Stitcher.
Leave us a rating in iTunes (it only takes 1 click and it really helps us).
Listen using the player below.

Episode #227

6 Apps to Help You Set 2019 Goals

It’s that time of year when we compile an outlandish list of ways we will disappoint ourselves over the next few months and call them “New Year’s Resolutions.” There’s a  better way to do this, though: setting goals. A goal is something you can measure and something you can take practical steps to achieve. It can be aggressive or imminently attainable, but either way it you must be able to measure progress and map out some reasonable steps to get there. Here are six apps I have found that help me achieve goals in different areas for which I used to set (and fail at) New Year’s Resolutions.

Saving Money – Digit

[image error]I found digit a couple years ago and have found it super helpful. It is automated savings based on the status of whatever bank account you tie it to. So it will save bit by bit of your account can afford it and slow down or stop if you cannot.  You can tell it to save more or less aggressively, and you can manually deposit money as well. If you are like me and aren’t the most disciplined saver this app is super helpful for emergency savings or saving for a specific expense.

(Oh, and for signing up through the link in this post they’ll give you and me both $5.)

Eating Healthier – MyFitnessPal

[image error]I’m in my mid 30s and I love to eat. That means that about 5 years ago I realized that my desk-sitting, restaurant-eating, coke-drinking lifestyle was really sticking with me. Mostly as love handles. In talking to my over-40 friends it seems this condition, known as “getting pudgy,” doesn’t resolve itself. So I had to figure out how to fix it. MyFitnessPal is an app (and website) that allows users to track all the food they eat, set goals for caloric intake, and track calories burned. It syncs with other fitness apps (Apple, fitbit, etc.) so that you can see the net intake of calories as well. Mostly it is a source of eating accountability as you see shocking numbers attached to donuts and cookies and coke and whatnot. At the very least it has been helpful in keeping my own bad habits in check.

Reading – Goodreads

[image error]Goodreads is like a playground for book lovers. It allows you to set goals, track your progress, interact with other readers, make wish lists, discover new titles or authors, leave ratings and reviews, see how other review books, and it even connects directly with Kindle if you’re into that sort of thing. If you want to read more books, read more from a certain author, read more of a specific genre, or some other goal Goodreads is the ideal app to help with that. It is both fun and useful and an ideal environment for those who want to be better readers.

Investing Money – Acorns

[image error]I am not an investor. I have a loose idea of what the stock market is and no idea how it works (except that you should never panic and always leave your money invested . . . right?). So when I ran across Acorns it seemed like the perfect place to get started for a novice like me. It takes whatever amount you want to invest, either a little bit at a time or big chunks, either one time deposits or recurring, and puts it into an investment portfolio on your behalf. You can give direction what kind of portfolio (small business, growth stocks, etc.) and you can customize it to your preferences as well. The kicker for someone like me is that Acorns will automatically accrue and invest your “spare change” by rounding up any amount you spend on approved debit or credit cards to the nearest dollar and investing those little bits. So that means, just by rounding up and putting a few dollars a week into my account I can easily invest $50-$100 monthly. It’s not an enormous amount, but it ads up and it’s $50-$100 more per month than I was investing before.

(Oh, and for signing up through the link in this post they’ll give you and me both $5.)

Fitness & Excercise – PushUps and Running Log

[image error] [image error]There are innumerable useful fitness and exercise apps. The key to finding the right one for you has little to do with the app and more to do with your persistence and consistency in using it. These are two that I use to track my progress in exercise goals month by month. These are simple apps that are basically for recording progress, almost like an exercise journal. There are others that offer plans, goals, maps, routes, and GPS tracking. Those are great too if you are looking for a more full service app. Again, the key to fitness apps is using them consistently.

 

 

 

Happy Rant Sports Episode #23 – Annoying Fans, Baseball Trades, and Football Trades

In this episode of The Happy Rant Sports podcast Ted and Barnabas discuss the following:

How is Ted responding to the Mariner’s first busy offseason since adopting them as his team?
Which fan base is most annoying?
Did the Raiders actually win their weird trades earlier this season?
A book recommendation

SPONSOR

Lagares Roasters is offering a special discount. If you use the code HAPPY20 at checkout you’ll get a 20% discount off your purchase until December 21, so move fast!. Get coffee and tea to make your holidays happier and to share with others!

Be sure to visit HappyRantPodcast.com where you can:

Order fresh roasted coffee from Lagares Roasters
Order your Happy Rant swag from Missional Wear (Use code RANT to get discounts on swag and/or shipping)

Please consider supporting the podcast financially as well. We have set up a Patreon page, and your donations help us cover production costs, do live events, and grow the podcast by trying some new things. Oh, and of course there are perks for those who commit to helps us such as free books and coffee!

To listen you can:

Subscribe in iTunes.
Listen on Google Play
Listen on Stitcher.
Leave us a rating in iTunes (it only takes 1 click and it really helps us).
Listen using the player below.

Episode #23

New Happy Rant: Theologian Name Game, Memorable Christmas Eves, and Bad Movies We Love

In this episode of The Happy Rant Ted, Ronnie, and Barnabas suss out the following:

Ronnie did it! He finally made it on TGC!
Ted invents a Theologian Name Game
Memorable Christmas Eve services, for good and ill
Terrible movies we love

SPONSOR

Lagares Roasters is offering a special discount. If you use the code HAPPY20 at checkout you’ll get a 20% discount off your purchase until December 21, so mov fast!. Get coffee and tea to make your holidays happier and to share with others!

Be sure to visit HappyRantPodcast.com where you can:

Order fresh roasted coffee from Lagares Roasters
Order your Happy Rant swag from Missional Wear (Use code RANT to get discounts on swag and/or shipping)

Please consider supporting the podcast financially as well. We have set up a Patreon page, and your donations help us cover production costs, do live events, and grow the podcast by trying some new things. Oh, and of course there are perks for those who commit to helps us such as free books and coffee!

To listen you can:

Subscribe in iTunes.
Listen on Google Play
Listen on Stitcher.
Leave us a rating in iTunes (it only takes 1 click and it really helps us).
Listen using the player below.

Episode #226

New Happy Rant: Ambition, The TGC Board, and Current Creative Projects

In this episode of The Happy Rant Ronnie interviews Ted about the following:

Ambition and career track and goals
What would it be like to be a TGC board member?
What current creative projects is Ted working on?

SPONSOR

Lagares Roasters is offering a special discount. If you use the code HAPPY20 at checkout you’ll get a 20% discount off your purchase. Get coffee and tea to make your holidays happier and to share with others!

Be sure to visit HappyRantPodcast.com where you can:

Order fresh roasted coffee from Lagares Roasters
Order your Happy Rant swag from Missional Wear (Use code RANT to get discounts on swag and/or shipping)

Please consider supporting the podcast financially as well. We have set up a Patreon page, and your donations help us cover production costs, do live events, and grow the podcast by trying some new things. Oh, and of course there are perks for those who commit to helps us such as free books and coffee!

To listen you can:

Subscribe in iTunes.
Listen on Google Play
Listen on Stitcher.
Leave us a rating in iTunes (it only takes 1 click and it really helps us).
Listen using the player below.

Episode #225

He Reads Truth: Christ Conquers Death

I have the privilege of contributing to He Reads Truth, a website of whose purpose is “To help men become who we were made to be, by doing what we were made to do, by the power and provision that God has given us to do it, for the glory of Jesus Christ.” They do this by providing scripture reading plans accompanied by reflections that can be accessed for free online or purchased as print books. For those of you looking to engage scripture in a fresh way – either because you are dried up or have been away from it, these studies/plans will refresh your soul and engage your mind.

What follows is one of the pieces I wrote for the plan on The Miracles of Jesus. You can find the full plan HERE.

Matthew 9:18-26, Luke 7:11-17, John 11:17-44

Death is final. It is the end—inevitable and unavoidable. Death is the last, worst enemy.

Those of us who are followers of Jesus know that a resurrection will come. We have hope in a future after death, like Mary did when her brother Lazarus died and she said she knew he’d rise again on the last day. That is a comfort, but it does little to remove the sting of death now. In this life, death is an irreversible loss that creates a vacuum in our lives where a person used to be.

But perhaps we misunderstand the resurrection. Maybe the resurrection is not merely an event at some undetermined future time.

Consider these stories.

Jesus was summoned to heal a gravely ill little girl. On His way, He stopped to heal a suffering woman; and when He arrived at the girl’s house, she had already passed. “She is not dead but asleep,” He announced (Matthew 9:24). Then He took her by the hand and raised her more easily than if she had been napping.

On His way to the town of Nain, Jesus passed a funeral procession. The man who had died was the only son of a widow, her caretaker in old age. She was utterly alone. Jesus felt compassion for her, so He spoke a word, and the young man sat up and was reunited with his mother (Luke 7:15). From death to life with a word.

And when Lazarus, Jesus’ dear friend, died, Jesus waited four days to arrive so that God’s glory could be revealed and people could see something essential to Jesus’ person and mission: “I am the resurrection and the life” (John 11:25).

Jesus declares that He is the resurrection. He embodies the resurrection and brings it to us. He gives the resurrection. When Mary offers her meager hope that her brother will rise one day, Jesus declares the resurrection to be something present—someone present.

This all sounds victorious and glorious—which it is—but on His way to the tomb, Jesus wept. He wept with and for the grief of others. He wept at the wreckage death caused. He wept because He knew loss. Then He walked to the tomb and showed death that its days were numbered, uttering, “Lazarus, come out!” (John 11:43).

The resurrection is yet to come. But the resurrection has also already come. It has been proven by Christ’s dismissal of death with words and actions.

Yes, death still hurts. It comes for us all, but we have more than a meager hope in a distant day. We have the resurrection Himself.

3 Things I Like This Week – December 7

Each week (give or take one here and there) I share three things I like – It could be a book, a movie, a podcast, an album, a photo, an article, a restaurant, a food item, a beverage, or anything else I simply enjoy and think you might too. You can find a whole pile of things, especially books, I like and recommend HERE.

1. Volume 1 (Live): The Precious Love of Christ

[image error]I don’t listen to CCM and most of the worship produced for the masses is charitably called “fluffy pop.” (There are less charitable descriptions that are more accurate and specific.) I do, however, love when churches write and produce worship music because it’s actually, you know, worship music. It’s even better when your own church does it, and today Immanuel Nashville‘s worship ministry has released their first album, The Precious Love of Christ. In Nashville, being that it’s a city full of musicians, it is common to find gifted artists leading music at churches. I’ve found that it’s much less common to find people who love Jesus deeply, love to worship, are gifted leaders, and can write/arrange songs beautifully leading at churches. We have those in spades at Immanuel and this album reflects that. I especially love tracks 5 and 8, but the whole album is great. Check it out.

2. On Writing Well by William Zinsser

[image error]My favorite book on writing is Stephen King’s On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft, but Zinsser’s book might be the best in terms of helping a writer get better. As a prolific writer of many genres and styles and on many subjects, Zinsser brings all his considerable knowledge and effort to bear in this book. It is practical, pointed, and lays out clear examples of both excellent and poor writing. It is the kind of book that is enjoyable to read for people who love the craft of writing but is helpful to read for anyone who has to do any writing. It is excellent and should be revisited often.

3. Singleness and the Gospel – a sermon by Sam Allberry

Last Sunday Sam Allberry preached at our church on “Singleness and the Gospel.” It was fantastic. He has a rare way of clearly framing things in a biblical perspective so that misconceptions are erased and truth and hope shine clearer. This kind of preaching leads to conviction and correction by invitation and discovery rather than aggression. This is a message for single people and for married people – the whole church – and is well worth your time.

New Happy Rant: Christmas Decorating, Book Lists, and Year-End Accomplishments

In this episode of The Happy Rant Ted, Barnabas, and Ronnie discuss the following:

Ronnie’s Christmas ethos and instagram posting habits
What would an “evangelical Christmas guy” be like”?
Year-end book lists
Year-end accomplishments lists

SPONSOR

Lagares Roasters is offering a special discount. If you use the code HAPPY20 at checkout you’ll get a 20% discount off your purchase. Get coffee and tea to make your holidays happier and to share with others!

Be sure to visit HappyRantPodcast.com where you can:

Order fresh roasted coffee from Lagares Roasters
Order your Happy Rant swag from Missional Wear (Use code RANT to get discounts on swag and/or shipping)

Please consider supporting the podcast financially as well. We have set up a Patreon page, and your donations help us cover production costs, do live events, and grow the podcast by trying some new things. Oh, and of course there are perks for those who commit to helps us such as free books and coffee!

To listen you can:

Subscribe in iTunes.
Listen on Google Play
Listen on Stitcher.
Leave us a rating in iTunes (it only takes 1 click and it really helps us).
Listen using the player below.

Episode #224

He Reads Truth: Motivations For Giving

I have the privilege of contributing to He Reads Truth, a website of whose purpose is “To help men become who we were made to be, by doing what we were made to do, by the power and provision that God has given us to do it, for the glory of Jesus Christ.” They do this by providing scripture reading plans accompanied by reflections that can be accessed for free online or purchased as print books. For those of you looking to engage scripture in a fresh way – either because you are dried up or have been away from it, these studies/plans will refresh your soul and engage your mind.

What follows is one of the pieces I wrote for the plan on 1 & 2 Corinthians. You can find the full plan HERE.

2 Corinthians 9:1-15, Psalm 126:1-6, Hosea 10:12

Generosity is a trait we love—in others, that is. Most of us love the idea of giving. When we do give, we don’t regret it, because it feels good to give. Sort of. Maybe. Sometimes we miss the money or time we gave and would like to have it back, or at least get something back in return. It’s easy to regret the cost of giving, but that’s not the attitude of a cheerful giver; it’s the attitude of an investor. We want dividends paid in exchange for our “gift,” or rather, our “investment.”

Today’s reading in 2 Corinthians 9 turns our attitude of investment generosity on its head. The picture it paints is that of a farmer sowing seed. In the spring he sows seed, and in the fall he harvests. How much he harvests and the quality of his harvest depends on how much he sows and the quality of his seed. If he scatters a few crummy seeds he will harvest a lean crop, but if he sows generously he will reap generously.

At first, this appears to be a similar metaphor to that of investing: you get out what you put in, plus a little extra. But Paul isn’t finished yet. Consider the farmer’s dependence on God. He puts little dead plant pods in dirt and prays God will transform it into growing, living sustenance. He hopes his seeds will bear fruit, but it isn’t up to him.

Next, notice how Paul describes what is reaped: “And God is able to make every grace overflow to you, so that in every way, always having everything you need, you may excel in every good work” (2 Corinthians 9:8).

Paul is not describing riches gained on a return investment. The harvest of generous sowing is due to “every grace,” so we can “excel in every good work.” Faithful, hopeful generosity results in abundant grace and growth in our lives, not necessarily our bank accounts. While these graces that help us do good work might include money or material gain, that is neither a guarantee nor the point. Our investment is in every good work, and that is our dividend.

Paul goes on to emphasize thanks, not reward. The fruit of generosity is thankfulness and “shouts of joy” (Psalm 126:5). That response reflects a kind of generosity I rarely see or participate in, but wouldn’t that be amazing? It would mean giving as we have received from God—lavishly, sacrificially, whole-heartedly, lovingly, and without ceasing. This kind of sowing reaps thanksgiving and praise. It is a pouring out of life, not just dollars. And the harvest is rich, beautiful, and bountiful.

Happy Rant Sports Episode #22 – Creed 2, Mike Conley, and Football Parity

In this episode of the Happy Rant Sports podcast Ted and Barnabas discuss the following:

Creed 2: Good, bad or meh?
The Rocky Franchise
Memorable games from our past
The underappreciated Mike Conley
Football parity and coaching

Be sure to visit HappyRantPodcast.com where you can:

Order fresh roasted coffee from Lagares Roasters
Order your Happy Rant swag from Missional Wear (Use code RANT to get discounts on swag and/or shipping)

Please consider supporting the podcast financially as well. We have set up a Patreon page, and your donations help us cover production costs, do live events, and grow the podcast by trying some new things. Oh, and of course there are perks for those who commit to helps us such as free books and coffee!

To listen you can:

Subscribe in iTunes.
Listen on Google Play
Listen on Stitcher.
Leave us a rating in iTunes (it only takes 1 click and it really helps us).
Listen using the player below.

 

Episode #22