Through Christ, we have been set free. Think about what it means not just to be free but also to live in freedom. It is possible to be free but to still live as if you aren’t…
As this man did, you will discover that God’s Word will be fulfilled. Regardless of what others may offer, stay in tune to the words of Jesus. There may be delays, some disappointments, but the promises of God will come to pass. The key is, whose voice are you listening to?
What does it take to be a nimble follower of Jesus Christ? Describing yourself as “nimble” (“quick,” “light,” “quick to comprehend”) may not be a trendy way to phrase a quality – I doubt I’ll see it on any t-shirts soon, unless it becomes a merchandised quote from a quirky show – but followers of Jesus Christ are called to be
Christ comes to free us; he comes to fit us for Kingdom living, and he comes to fill us, to fill us with his Holy Spirit. And that’s our need, friends, the power of the Holy Spirit.
Happy are those whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Happy are those to whom the LORD imputes no iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no deceit. While I kept silence, my body wasted away through my groaning all day long. For day and night your hand was heavy upon me; my strength was dried up as by
There’s an operative logic of redemption running so deep in Western storytelling that, given enough time, we should expect that all villains will eventually become heroes. Origen may have been wrong to state that even the devil will eventually be saved, but a certain kind of “narrative universalism” is true in Hollywood.
And so we come to see that living in simplicity goes hand in hand with a life in pursuit of holiness, or sanctifying grace. For if you do a word search of “simplicity” through Wesley’s works, you will quite often find that he speaks of it in relation to Mary’s action of sitting by Jesus feet, drawing deeply from the
Many emotions welled up within me as I heard the news of the recent tragedy break. But the one that unexpectedly stood out was awe. Awe? How can you feel a sense of awe after hearing the news of such a heinous and horrendous act of racial dehumanization? Because my brothers and sisters at Emmanuel AME loved their neighbor. Furthermore,
Racial reconciliation calls people to have “out of the ordinary” moments frequently. It challenges our social and spiritual status quo. One response to the tragedy at Mother Emanuel should be for churches to have more “out of the ordinary” moments with people of a different race around conversations that make us uncomfortable. It is the best way forward.
The media photographer clicked at just the right moment. The woman’s face is crumpled, crying out, grieving. In fact, the use of the picture almost feels…voyeuristic. How long will morning news shows play subdued tones, proclaiming the latest tragedy, in this case, “Special Edition: Charleston” in a way that reminds us all that every news outlet is for-profit? The photo
The promise is not that we would be safe but that we would be faithful. The angel of God does not always spare us from tragedy or troubles, but enables us to look at tragedy troubles through different eyes.
I find myself walking in the semi-dark, friends clustered around me. Our hands are full, carrying materials to preserve a corpse. It was a long Sabbath. We were supposed to rest, so we did. But there’s no rest from thoughts of despair and grief. They follow you into every room you enter. Like we had followed Him. We saw the
We must be honest about our failures and sins. None of us lives up to the standards our faith demands. But this doesn’t mean we cease wrestling with and proclaiming the Word.
Paul, called to be an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and our brother Sosthenes, To the church of God that is in Corinth, to those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, together with all those who in every place call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and
I confess that I don’t know that much about adoption. I used to tell my little brother that he was adopted—from the animal shelter. I have reaped the consequences of this in my own sons, as the generational dysfunction marches on. I remember lying in bed as an angsty teen, wondering what it would feel like to be chosen, wanted,
What makes us think we can make such an audacious request? The resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Believing in a miracle, a rationally unexplainable occurrence, takes exactly what Tillich describes–a faith that transcends our comprehension without excluding our consciousness. In other words, we should know what we are asking for but not expect the miracle to come in ways we can
A proposed pipeline in my community has caused me to consider the nature of Christian faith and our lives as disciples. I’m not talking about the political, economic or environmental ramifications of pipelines, but the pros and cons of using the analogy of the Christian way of life, our discipleship, as a pipeline. On one hand, the idea of having
The mystery that surrounds us belongs to different modes of perception. That is why he said, “The heart has reasons the mind knows not of.” It is the heart that is able to see into that mystery. And it is why Paul said to the Ephesians, “I pray that God will enlighten the eyes of your heart, so you may
In his latest book, The Death of the Messiah and the Birth of the New Covenant: A (Not So) New Model of the Atonement, Michael Gorman argues that the ultimate purpose of Jesus’ atonement was to “create a transformed people, a (new) people living out a (new) covenant relationship with God together. Moreover, this people will not simply believe in
He described the Christian calendar as being like a spiral staircase: you come to the same point in the circle each year, but you have ascended higher up the stairs each year than you were the year before, or at least that is the purpose of the Christian calendar.
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