Jonathan Parnell Photo

Jonathan Parnell

Jonathan Parnell is the lead pastor of Cities Church in Saint Paul, Minnesota, where he lives with his wife, Melissa, and their eight children. He is the author of Mercy for Today: A Daily Prayer from Psalm 51.

Do Not Hinder Them: Why We Baptize Believing Children

Do Not Hinder Them

Why We Baptize Believing Children

Some churches delay baptizing children out of a fear of granting false assurance, but have we thought carefully enough about the costs of withholding a basic grace?

The Manly Work of Pastors

The Manly Work of Pastors

Should only men be pastors? Scripture shows us the necessity and beauty of saying yes.

Pastors Are Teachers First: A Paragraph That Reformed My Ministry

Pastors Are Teachers First

A Paragraph That Reformed My Ministry

When pastors understand they are primarily teachers, and the goal of their teaching is the salvation of souls, then pastors will pray.

God, Make Us Bold About Jesus

God, Make Us Bold About Jesus

When the early church prayed, they asked for boldness to share what they knew about Jesus. How might our churches change if we started praying the same?

Pray Until You Pray: A Simple Way to Begin Each Day

Pray Until You Pray

A Simple Way to Begin Each Day

If you are struggling in your prayer life, consider adopting one small habit the first thing each morning: rehearse a simple prayer filled with truth.

Let the Little Children Come to Me: Invitation to the Weak and Needy

Let the Little Children Come to Me

Invitation to the Weak and Needy

If children feel like an inconvenient distraction from what’s really important, come see them through the eyes of the most important person in history.

Hungry and Hungover: How Our Emptiness Tells the Truth

Hungry and Hungover

How Our Emptiness Tells the Truth

Our unfulfilled longings may mock us, disappoint us, and leave us lost. They also tell us that God made us for more than this broken world.

Voices We Need in the New Normal

Voices We Need in the New Normal

The Whirling Adventure of ‘Retrodoxy’

Most Americans today are fine saying they believe in “God” — so long as he never actually requires anything from them.

Your Neighbor Is Not a Number

Your Neighbor Is Not a Number

Are We Letting Stats About the Lost Say Too Much?

Our cities may be dark and messed up in their own ways. But let’s agree together that they’re not all bad — and we may need rethink the way we talk about our cities.

Your Sorrow Will Turn to Joy

Your Sorrow Will Turn to Joy

Morning & Evening Meditations for Holy Week

A team of pastors and scholars walk us through Holy Week with short meditations for each morning and evening, from Palm Sunday to the triumph of Easter.

Jesus Paid It All

Jesus Paid It All

“Jesus paid it all.” Some of the most relevant things you need to know today are simple and familiar. Meditate on what Jesus has done, and marvel that he did it for you.

Two Obstacles to a Relationship with God

Two Obstacles to a Relationship with God

Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, and since we have a…

Living the American Nightmare

Living the American Nightmare

It’s not the nightmare of violence in the Middle East, or the generic nightmare of life in a fallen world. It’s the American Nightmare — the one where millions of us are murdered, and our body parts are quietly sold for research, all by an organization our government is funding.

Designed for Joy

Designed for Joy

How the Gospel Impacts Men and Women, Identity and Practice

God created men and women in his image — equal in value and complementary in roles, which are integral to God’s good design for humanity.

Is Our Stance on Abortion Too Flimsy?

Is Our Stance on Abortion Too Flimsy?

The last few weeks have sparked outrage among Christians and any who advocate for the rights of unborn children. These videos on Planned Parenthood’s work expose them for the horror they are. The grim truth, though, is that still many Christians are not really bothered by it all.

Planned Parenthood: How Much Longer?

Planned Parenthood: How Much Longer?

Today a video was released of Planned Parenthood’s Senior Director of Medical Services casually describing how they sell aborted babies’ organs for profit. It’s just another example of the abortion industry self-destructing. How much longer will we allow it to continue, America?

Lord, You’re Beautiful

Lord, You’re Beautiful

As for me, I shall behold your face in righteousness; when I awake, I shall be satisfied with your likeness. (Psalm 17:15) One day we will stand before Jesus. If we could see through the clutter of our lives now…

Call That Love

I sing lullabies to my four-year-old son. I usually make them up on the fly, and they sound horrible. He appreciates them, though, and so, every night as I tuck him into bed, by his request, I sing him another…

Freed from Self-Absorption

Freed from Self-Absorption

C.S. Lewis helps awaken us to the “astonishing realness of things.” It’s what Alan Jacobs calls an “omnivorous attentiveness” — a bewildering awareness of the things all around us. It is being alive to what is, to things that…

Either ‘Okay’ or ‘Thank You’

Either ‘Okay’ or ‘Thank You’

Everyday Life and the Father’s Will

My five-year-old can’t stop saying the f-word. It just happened. I didn’t teach it to her. Her mom didn’t either. But again and again — and every Saturday without fail . . .

Game-Changer for Bible Reading

Game-Changer for Bible Reading

How does the Old Testament point to Jesus? In this four-minute video, Bryan Chapell tackles this crucial question for preaching and teaching, as well as everyday Bible reading.

Die Well

As a society, especially those of us in the younger generation, we haven’t come to grips with what dying is all about. We don’t really know what it is or what it means. At best, we’re confused. At worst, we’ve invoked a kind of intentional ignorance.

God’s Grace Will Find You

God’s Grace Will Find You

The phrase is so popular, do we really know what David is saying? “Even though,” he begins, “*Even though* I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil. . .” (verse 4).

Where Is Heaven on Earth?

Where Is Heaven on Earth?

Once in college I went to a prayer meeting put on by a small Evangelical denomination in the rural South. It was the kind of denomination that has a string of adjectives before the word “Baptist” — the kind that you might expect to handle snakes or something.

Jesus Turns the Tables

Jesus Turns the Tables

Holy Monday

Holy Monday. It may have felt like a normal Monday morning in our world — a day to restart the grind. Jesus even went into Jerusalem to take care of business.

New Resources
in Your Inbox

A digest from Desiring God