TwelveTwelve: The Leader Blog of North Wake Church

By Erik Raymond  https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/erik-raymond/providence-and-charity/ Read: Psalm 72:1-4; 12-14 I was recently visiting with a friend and he remarked as to how convicted he was in reading Charity and Its Fruits by Jonathan Edwards.  My friend specifically articulated how precisely Edwards used the Scriptures to expose his own heart attitude of selfishness.  As I sat and listened I myself was convicted.  And furthermore, I was convicted because, for whatever reason, I never finished reading the classic work by Edwards. As a result I picked up the book again.  Now I am wondering why I ever put it down in the first place!  The

By R.C. Sproul  https://www.ligonier.org/learn/devotionals/rest-come Read: Psalm 95 “For forty years I loathed that generation and said, ‘They are a people who go astray in their heart, and they have not known my ways.’ Therefore I swore in my wrath, ‘They shall not enter my rest’” (vv. 10–11). - Psalm 95 Typical of every portion of the Old Testament, the Ten Commandments are not only ends in themselves but rather point to a future in which their intent will find its fullest expression in the new heaven and earth. They anticipate an age when they will be followed in all their fullness as

Read: Psalm 133 How providential that the week in which our new president was inaugurated with prolific calls for unity, we find ourselves studying Psalm 133, a psalm that speaks to the beauty and peace that is created by real Christian unity.  There is nothing like it.  It flows out from its source and it blesses everything downstream, nourishing and bringing life just like the dew that falls on Mount Hermon ends up watering the hills of Zion (Jerusalem).   We wrote a song several years ago from this Psalm.  Listen to it here and read the lyrics as you listen. 

By Gloria Furman.  https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/where-does-my-help-come-from Read: Psalm 97 As I looked forward to settling into my new role as a mother, I was given a role that I didn’t anticipate — caregiver for my husband. A couple of years after we got married, Dave developed a debilitating nerve condition that afflicted both of his arms. My athletic, cheerful husband became disabled and discouraged. When our first child grew past about eight pounds, it broke Dave’s heart (and mine) that his chronic pain and atrophy wouldn’t allow him to hold his newborn. We needed help and hope. We Lift Up Our Eyes for

By Ryan Griffith.  https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/psalm-103-learning-how-to-talk-to-yourself Read: Psalm 103 Do you talk to yourself? I don’t mean when you’re wrestling through your taxes or walking through your to-do list. But do you talk yourself, really? When you are fearful, do you command your soul to trust in the Lord?  When your affections are low, do you command your heart to bless the Lord? As Paul Tripp is fond of saying, “no one is more influential in your life than you are because no one talks to you more than you do.” In the particularly difficult moments of the day, how do you talk to yourself? How

Steadiness in a Year of Suffering Marshall Segal (@marshallsegal) is a writer and managing editor at desiringGod.org. He’s the author of Not Yet Married: The Pursuit of Joy in Singleness & Dating. He graduated from Bethlehem College & Seminary. He and his wife, Faye, have two children and live in Minneapolis. https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/more-bad-news-may-come Read: Mark 6:34  At the end of a year like ours — with tens of millions infected and over a million dead, with rising political hostility and upheaval, with racial friction and distrust inflamed, with economic uncertainty and instability, with more devastating wildfires, with churches struggling to know how to respond —

Written by Yvonne Nannette.  http://www.hopeinthehealing.com/2014/12/03/what-child-is-this-story-behind-carol/ READ: Luke 2.1-20; Phil. 2.5-11 As a manager of an insurance company, you would not think that William Chatterton Dix (1837-1898) would have written one of our favorite Christmas Carols. Born in Bristol, England, his father was a surgeon who had also written a biography on Thomas Chatterton, the poet, and also the reason for William’s middle name. Dix became very sick and was in bed for a long time recovering. He had plenty of time to pray and read the Word of God and from this experience his life was truly changed for the better. He began