The Chairman’s Intent. In this episode of Banned Books, we converse about the Gospel, ritual, and how and why God embodies his grace while reading John Kleinig’s article, Rituals and the Enactment of the Gospel.

And Your Bird Can Sing! Gillespie and Riley conclude their discussion of hymnody with Chad Bird’s hymn, The Infant Priest Was Holy Born. Again, they focus on pastoral care, comfort for Christians, and what happens when the church ignores the reality of sin, death, and Satan.

Do You Have a Great Hymn This Week? Go Fish! This week, Gillespie and Riley discuss Thomas Chisholm’s poem turned hymn, Great is Thy Faithfulness. More discussion of hymnody, church music, and how what we sing can help or hinder pastoral care.

Jesus joins us in our weirdness. In this episode, Gillespie and Riley continue their discussion of how to judge a hymn with Joseph Scriverner’s classic hymn, "What a Friend We Have in Jesus."

Pump the hate brakes, Riley! This week, Gillespie and Riley begin a four-episode discussion on how to judge a hymn. In the first installment, they look at Amazing Grace and ask: "Is this a great, good, or bad hymn?" What makes a Christian hymn great? What should a church do with bad hymns?

This week, we read from Bo Giertz’s novel, “The Hammer of God,” and discuss belief, revivalism versus liturgy, and what happens when Jesus alone is the focus of all our attention.

In this episode, Gillespie and Riley read and discuss Billy Graham’s sermon, and the consequences of preaching law after the Gospel, adverbs, and the importance of staying away from God where He isn’t preached, revealed, and worshipped in Christ Jesus.