As you treat others with mercy, and seek to live a godly life, you will gain the respect of others, as well as find contentment and joy. Doing right and treating others with respect brings a sense of peace and completeness. It allows one, regardless of their current circumstances, to feel complete.
Like our own lives, the painting included brokenness, sin, and pain. Yet, as the Holy Spirit moved through our days together, new images emerged. Through layers of color and the intensity of heat, the previous images were reformed and renewed, and recreated into something beautiful.
Change happens, renewal and revival come not because we have designed it, or wanted it, or worked for it, but because God in his infinite grace and unfettered mercy, in his own time and according to his design, brings new life to persons, to congregations, to denominations, to movements, and ministries.
I bring you greetings in the life-giving name of Jesus Christ from your sisters and brothers around the world who are following Jesus just as you are – in the company of the Wesleys. We are part of an amazing movement – over 80 million strong. There are only two groups of Christians who have a bigger family than we
Jane Eyre, Jane Austen, and John Wesley: One of these things is not like the others, One of these things just doesn’t belong. If you consider the three names mentioned above and come up with several possible responses, you’d be well within reason. There simply is no one definitive answer because, depending upon context, any one figure could be sorted
This circular nature is intrinsic to the internal life of the Trinity, which is why it grounds our life and witness and provides a good metaphor for the stance we’re to take. Having been transformed by God’s embrace, we go on to be a transformative presence in the lives of others.
In this particular letter, Jeremiah becomes the linkage between God’s promises for yet-to-be newness and the embittered exiles who are certain that they are unfairly suffering for the sins of previous generations. A creative proverb was gaining popularity among these disenfranchised refugees—everybody was sharing it on their Facebook wall: “The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are
Pay attention to the moments where you are quick to show faith and the places where fear tends to creep in. For a lot of us, faith and fear come in patterns. When fear shows up it is a sign that God has work to do in that place. Celebrate where you are being faithful but don’t hide or minimize
What will we be sharing from our Methodist/Wesleyan “waka” (canoe) in whatever region of the world we minister? What treasures and gifts will we share?
Just as in pre-missionary Tonga, the moral sense of the people was identified with the moral sense of the chiefs, now in Christian Tonga, Jesus is the “chief of chiefs” – the ‘eiki ‘o e ngaahi ‘eiki.
“The grace of redemption can come upon us all at once like a crashing wave. It can reveal itself over a season of life similar to how the autumn leaves move from green to vivid orange, red, and yellow. It can even be relentless in how it floods our souls over and over again.”
“Now some Calvinists clearly understand the logic of their position, and do not shrink from this implication. Classic Calvinist theologian Arthur W. Pink wrote: ‘when we say God is sovereign in the exercise of His love, we mean that He loves whom He chooses. God does not love everybody.’”
I encountered Jesus on a trip to a mercy ministry in Bangalore. The people at this particular place were a mix of old, disabled, infirm and insane. But in some pairs of eyes, I could see what Mother Teresa talked about: Jesus in his most distressing disguise. I sat by a woman who was skin and bones. Half-naked and not fully
Each season has its ebb and flow, its ups and downs. Why is it, then, that we are still wrapping our minds around change management and leading change within local congregations? Think of change like you think of the seasons.
“Like divine sovereignty, predestination is not a Calvinist doctrine, it is a biblical doctrine. And indeed, as a theologian steeped in Scripture, Wesley not only affirmed the doctrine, he affirmed a very strong version of it…”
Prayer. It is as natural as breathing. Most of us, regardless of faith, will find ourselves praying instinctively at some point in our lives. Typically, the prayer that flows unbidden from our heart is a prayer formed in our soul that expresses our deep distress as a plea of boldness for help or guidance. Or the prayer might be one
How can a loving God send people to hell? The text comes from John 3:16-21: “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. Whoever believes in him is not
Intuition is a direct knowledge or awareness of something without conscious attention or reasoning; it is non-intellectual perception. Nothing innately spiritual is either stated or implied in that definition. When a person allows the Holy Spirit to take control of his or her natural intuition, the result is spiritual intuition. Discernment through spiritual intuition provides deeper understanding and expands the
“I was headed in the wrong direction, even though the church was headed in the right direction.”
The sovereignty of God is a vitally important truth Wesleyans badly need to recover. This is not only because it is crucial for understanding the biblical drama, but also because many Wesleyans have tended to neglect it because Calvinists often give the impression that it is one of their distinctive doctrines. But the sovereignty of God is not a Calvinist
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