Blogs by Phil Ryken

We should be grieving deeply with our brothers and sisters in Turkey and China.I say in Turkey because of the vicious torture and cruel murder of three men who were meeting for a Bible study in Malatya.  They were found on... continue

Newsweek's recent debate between Sam Harris and Rick Warren ("God Debate") has a number of compelling moments, including the following litany of questions, courtesy of Sam Harris:"How is it fair for God to have designed a world which gives such ambiguous... continue

Few things are more out of fashion of among contemporary readers (a declining breed as it is) than poetry.  At a Bible study workshop last Saturday I asked a group of PCA women to finish the following sentence: "The problem... continue

James Montgomery Boice (1938-2000) On April 22, 2007 a memorial plaque commemorating the service of James Montgomery Boice as Senior Minister of Tenth Presbyterian Church was unveiled. In late 2000, Tenth formed a committee to recommend a suitable memorial in... continue

Spied at PCRT in Grand Rapids: Ligon Duncan hunkered down in a corner of the Country Kitchen, his nose in a book.  A new book by J. R. R. Tolkien, as it turns out, which Ligon was trying to read... continue

My entrance into the blogosphere will be sporadic over the next week or two as I prepare to speak at the Women in the Church leadership and Mission to North America mercy ministry conferences in Atlanta on Friday, April 20, and... continue

For the last several years Tenth Church has been performing a concert on the evening of Good Friday -- something that has proven to be a suitable recognition of the day and an effective outreach to our Center City community.This... continue

Charles Spurgeon's sermon "Christ's First and Last Subject" is on repentance, which Christ preached both at the beginning (see Matthew 4:17) and at the end (see Luke 24:47) of his earthly ministry.Spurgeon's taxonomy of true and saving repentance is a... continue

This morning I came downstairs to find two of the young women in my life (age 2 and age 4, respectively), lifting up hockey sticks in the entry way and singing loud "Hallelujahs!"  The word "Hallelujah" was sung frequently last... continue

Recently I read Otherwise, a collection of new and selected poems by Jane Kenyon, including the last poems she wrote before dying of leukemia in 1995.  One of my favorite Kenyon poems is "Man Sleeping," a short piece that calls us... continue