In the midst of the Advent season, many church leaders are busy preparing for some extra special: Extra and Special worship services. These services generally draw people to church who have not been before or who have not been in a long time. These can be wonderful times of evangelistic energy. Newcomers to the church can be invited into the
“I’m pregnant!” The announcement demands a response. At times the response is easy: There are hugs and cheers, whoops, whirls, and texts—the group kind. At times the response is complicated: There are glances and glares, winces, wails, and tears—not the good kind. When a baby is a dream come true, the announcers set to painting a room, taking vitamins, writing
“The angels filled the sky saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men.” How does “Emmanuel,” God with us, bring peace into our lives? In what area of your life would you like for God’s peace to come?”
“Ours is an age of noise. We exchange our history for comforting lies of other gods. We exchange our worship for spectacles. We exchange true justice for parodies, imitations, mimicry. We fill our lives with noise. We silence the Word of the Lord.
But the Word comes nevertheless, not in an earthquake or fire or rushing wind, but in
One Sabbath, when Jesus went to eat in the house of a prominent Pharisee, he was being carefully watched. There in front of him was a man suffering from abnormal swelling of his body. Jesus asked the Pharisees and experts in the law, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath or not?” But they remained silent. So taking hold
And so you teach me:
Certainty has become my idol.
Predictability.
Expectations met.
That looks like faith to me:
I ask, knowing that you can.
There are quite a few opinions about a recent celebrity in the spotlight for a high-profile conversion to Christianity. Or an alleged conversion to Christianity, depending on your point of view. Which celebrity it is doesn’t matter as much, because any time a celebrity joins anything, the people who belong to the faith or organization are thrilled. It’s like getting
Let the message about Christ, in all its richness, fill your lives. Teach and counsel each other with all the wisdom he gives. Sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs to God with thankful hearts. Colossians 3:16 (NLT) In many parts of the world, governments set aside a day dedicated to giving thanks. In the United States that day falls
Why might people who are poor be brokenhearted? God calls our actions and our attitudes to be right toward people with few resources.
“When Christ is squeezed from the Body of Christ by our own priorities and agenda as a congregation or through our busyness as leaders or disciples, what is left is little more than a corpse masquerading as a church.”
Jesus left His disciples. Jesus said, “I am with you always even to the end of the age.” (Matt. 28:20). It wasn’t much long after that He was taken up into the air. He leaves. What is the most common question or statement made by a person in crisis? Where is God in this? Some days I look around and
So, you spend all your time obsessing with others’ expectations of you. The simple truth is this: a life filled with others’ expectations is a life empty of God’s realities. The apostle Paul said it first in Galatians 1:10, “Am I now seeking human approval, or God’s approval? Or am I trying to please people? If I were still pleasing
Most churches have interns at one time or another. This can either be a great experience, or a terrible one (though it will probably be somewhere in between). Done well, an internship program can give you greater levels of effectiveness, train up next-gen leaders, and expand the possibilities for great future ministry in the church. Done poorly, it can eat
Here’s the deal with the whole alarm clock thing – the wake part is God’s work, and God did a pretty good job of it in releasing all that God energy into the world 2000 years ago. But now it’s the get up part. The question is, are we going to sleep right through?
I’ll bet there are roads you could drive blindfolded if you really needed to. Maybe it’s the road from your house to the entrance of your subdivision, or the route you take to work, or the circuitous path you carve in your daily routine – stop, start, turn, pause, start again. The rhythm of acceleration, brake, the swing of the
We are examining this Teacher-Student-Teacher relationship between Paul, who invested in Timothy and expected Timothy to invest in others as a model for not only how, but what to pass “downline.” Last week we opened in chapter 1 of 1 Timothy where Paul, before teaching even the first “what,” sets the context – Grace. Everything that will be taught, should
When people do get a taste of healthy Christian community, it is often like water in a dry land. It is quickly absorbed and serves to make one more aware of a deep longing to be known, seen, heard, cared for, and most of all loved. Many Christian are hungry for this kind of connection with others.
During this Lenten season there was a lot of noise surrounding four movies: Noah, Heaven is for Real, God’s Not Dead, and The Son of God. When Easter is nearing it is commonplace for a proliferation of “evidence” to come forth that will now put this Jesus-rising-from-the-dead business to rest. Maybe these movies’ release dates were strategic so that they
For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. That’s Sir Isaac Newton’s third law of motion. It explains how birds fly and fish swim. Jump on a trampoline and you’ll experience the third law firsthand: You force the bounce mat down, and it springs back to throw you up into the air. Newton’s law applies to actions and
What are we called to do and say in our world? Sometimes we need to turn our jerseys inside out. Play the game but don’t play it unaware. Be the voice of change today in your system, company, church, and world.
Get articles delivered directly to your inbox as soon as they come out.
