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David Mathis

David Mathis is executive editor for desiringGod.org and pastor at Cities Church. He is a husband, father of four, and author of Workers for Your Joy: The Call of Christ on Christian Leaders (2022).
Article

A Marriage Advice Moment with John Piper

Mar 12, 2009
A staff member at Bethlehem asked Pastor John what one or two main things he wants to say to an engaged couple in premarital counseling. His answer is relevant for marriages new and old Be joyfully, brokenheartedly, shaped by the…
David Mathis
Mar 12, 2009
Article

Don't Just Be Passively Hospitable

Apr 20, 2009
In Romans 12:13, Paul points out that one effect of God’s mercy on his people is that they “seek to show hospitality.” Seek. Pursue. Chase after. They are not merely willing to be hospitable when someone comes to the…
David Mathis
Apr 20, 2009
Article

Learning from Flawed Faith

May 24, 2009
The book of Judges—what a mess! It starts bad and gets worse and worse, then ends so poorly that it’s awkward to read in public Yet God put it in the Book and means it to be for “our instruction”…
David Mathis
May 24, 2009
Article

Sitting Where Angels Stand

Jun 2, 2009
What’s more impressive than standing in God’s presence? Sitting—and doing so at the right hand An angel said to John the Baptist’s father: “I am Gabriel, who stands in the presence of God” (Luke 1:19). That’s noteworthy. But more so…
David Mathis
Jun 2, 2009
Article

How John the Baptist Handled the Attention

Jun 10, 2009
God gave him a message, and so he went around delivering it. “The word of God came to John”—we call him John the Baptist—and “he went into all the region around the Jordan [River], proclaiming a baptism of repentance for…
David Mathis
Jun 10, 2009
Article

Strong in Another’s Strength

Jun 14, 2009
Laziness is not the alternative to living in your own strength. Paul talks about being strong in the strength of another Ephesians 6:10: “Be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might.” Colossians 1:29: “I toil [to…
David Mathis
Jun 14, 2009
Article

Hope for Sexual Strugglers

Jun 25, 2009
David fell in 2 Samuel 11. He saw that Bathsheba was “very beautiful,” and he followed his lusts down the slope to adultery—and then even to having her husband killed But by 1 Kings 1, David is able to be…
David Mathis
Jun 25, 2009
Article

Born to Gerard

Life of Calvin | 1509–1523

Jul 10, 2009
Five hundred years ago today, he was born Jean Cauvin in Noyon, France—about 70 miles north of Paris. His father was Gerard, son of a barrelmaker and boatman. Gerard was a lawyer, and it was his law practice that brought…
David Mathis
Jul 10, 2009
Article

Off to Paris

Life of Calvin | 1523–1532

Jul 12, 2009
It was 1523, and Calvin was 14 years old when he went off to university in Paris—70 miles south of his native city of Noyon. Providentially, he didn’t need to leave home alone, but went with two of the De…
David Mathis
Jul 12, 2009
Article

De Clementia, Conversion, and Cop

Life of Calvin | 1532–1533

Jul 16, 2009
Calvin was growing disillusioned with humanism while studying law in Bourges in 1531 when his father died. Freed from dad’s expectations of making law his profession, Calvin packed his bags for Paris to resume his theological pursuits It was 1532…
David Mathis
Jul 16, 2009
Article

Institutes

Life of Calvin | 1535–1536

Jul 19, 2009
Calvin wrote as a fugitive. Exiled from France, he eventually settled in Basel where he found enough leisure to put together the first edition of his Institutes of the Christian Religion The first edition debuted in March of 1536…
David Mathis
Jul 19, 2009
Article

A Night's Stay in Geneva

Life of Calvin | 1536–1538

Jul 24, 2009
William Farel was the fiery redhead who cursed John Calvin’s ivory-tower life in Strasbourg and twisted his arm to stay in Geneva. Here’s the story Having published his Institutes, which were immediately successful, Calvin left Basel, still a fugitive…
David Mathis
Jul 24, 2009
Article

The Golden Years

Life of Calvin | 1538–1541

Jul 27, 2009
Calvin spent the happiest years of his life outside Geneva. It started in April of 1538 when Calvin and fellow reformer William Farel were expelled from Geneva Their eager reforms were moving quicker than the city council was ready for…
David Mathis
Jul 27, 2009
Article

Return to Geneva

Life of Calvin | 1541–1553

Aug 1, 2009
After a golden three-year exile, Calvin returned to the city that expelled him. He didn’t jump at the opportunity but went reluctantly, feeling constrained by God’s will to resume the work It was September, 1541 when he stepped back into…
David Mathis
Aug 1, 2009
Article

The Fateful Years

Life of Calvin | 1553–1554

Aug 7, 2009
T.H.L. Parker calls 1553–1554 Calvin’s “fateful years.” According to Parker, this was when “two large storms blew from different quarters and raged simultaneously.” One was Calvin’s battle with the libertines; the other was the infamous Servetus affair The Genevan air…
David Mathis
Aug 7, 2009
Article

An Unmarked Grave

Life of Calvin | 1554–1564

Aug 10, 2009
Calvin fell deathly ill in the winter of 1558 at age 49. He thought he was at death’s doorstep and so turned his few remaining energies to the final revision of his Institutes. Until this time, he hadn’t been…
David Mathis
Aug 10, 2009
Article

Jesus Treated Women Differently

Aug 13, 2009
Fellow complementarians, try framing the gender debate in three categories instead of two Feminists and egalitarians love it when everything to their right is cast as one monolithic “complementarianism.” But authentic complementarians need to highlight that there is not only…
David Mathis
Aug 13, 2009
Article

Esther & Jesus: "The Reverse Occurred"

Aug 30, 2009
The Hebrew Scriptures point to Jesus in a myriad of ways. One way is narrative patterns, like the one in Esther 9:1 On the very day when the enemies of the Jews hoped to gain the mastery over them, the…
David Mathis
Aug 30, 2009
Article

How to Read Exodus and Other OT Books

Sep 9, 2009
Tremper Longman has produced another beneficial resource for reading and rightly appropriating the Old Testament. This time it’s How to Read Exodus.
David Mathis
Sep 9, 2009
Article

God in a Manger, Part 1: Jesus Is Lord

Dec 22, 2009
Advent is my yearly reminder to brush up on Christology, the doctrine of the person of Christ. I’ve found it helpful to approach the subject under three headings Jesus as Lord (fully divine) Jesus as Savior (fully human) Jesus as…
David Mathis
Dec 22, 2009
Article

God in a Manger, Part 2: Jesus Is Savior

Dec 23, 2009
Yesterday we summed up Jesus’s full divinity under the heading “Jesus Is Lord.” We said that the doctrine of the incarnation could be remembered with John 1:14, “The Word became flesh.” That “Word” is the divine second person of the…
David Mathis
Dec 23, 2009
Article

God in a Manger, Part 3: Jesus Is Treasure

Dec 24, 2009
We’ve looked at Jesus’ full divinity under the heading “Jesus Is Lord” and his full humanity under “Jesus Is Savior.” Now we turn to his single personhood and utter uniqueness that makes him our soul-satisfying Treasure The term hypostatic union…
David Mathis
Dec 24, 2009
Article

Rethinking Perfection

Jan 22, 2010
Jesus keeps us off balance. We think we know that perfection is a fastball of justice, and he throws us the curveball of grace When I read Matthew 5:48 abstracted from it’s context, I’m thinking mainly in terms of justice. …
David Mathis
Jan 22, 2010
Article

The Permanent Value of TULIP

Mar 17, 2010
In his introductory essay to John Owen’s The Death of Death in the Death of Christ, J. I. Packer writes that Calvinism and Arminianism are “two coherent interpretations of the biblical gospel, which stand in evident opposition to each…
David Mathis
Mar 17, 2010
Article

Beyond Five Points

Mar 18, 2010
Don’t limit your understanding of God’s absolute sovereignty to five points in a mnemonic device (TULIP). Do start there, or at least cover that terrain in due course, but know that there is so much more to the…
David Mathis
Mar 18, 2010

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