Pursuing a holistic expression of Christian faith that is true to the Bible and applicable for today’s world.
Christmas and Easter Focus on Jesus, Preparing for Pentecost to Complete His Work and Reveal the Holy Spirit Though it’s been co-opted by secular society, Christmas remains as the most popular Christian holiday, celebrating the birth of Jesus. Next in notoriety stand the tandem of Good Friday, remembering the execution of Jesus, and Easter, celebrating […]
Let God Built and Protect All That We Do There are fifteen songs of ascent in the Bible. Five of them are in today’s reading. Four of the fifteen are ascribed to David and one to Solomon; the rest are anonymous. Most of them are quite short. We understand the people would sing these songs […]
Mentoring Can Help Us Grow in Our Faith and Increase Our Impact People sometimes ask me to mentor them. I’m honored that they ask. I want to say yes. Instead, I decline as respectfully as I can. Why? It’s because God hasn’t called me to be a mentor—at least not in the traditional sense. He’s […]
Celebrate Jesus’s Return to Heaven, Which Prepares the Way for Pentecost In my post The Four Main Christian Celebrations, I list for holy days (holidays) that smartly recognize Jesus and succinctly outline the key elements of his life and what he did for us. These Christian holidays are: I wonder if I should add Ascension […]
We Must Pick Up Our Cross and Follow Jesus Many people profess Jesus but follow the world instead of following him. We shouldn’t live close to the world. We should keep a safe distance. Though we don’t need to change our behavior to earn God’s favor, we should want to change in response for what […]
Embrace Scripture as Present, Available, and Relevant In most of my books and a lot of my blog posts I write about the Bible in present tense. This is an intentional effort to remind us that the Bible is not only an ancient text but also one that’s present, available, and relevant to us today. […]
May We Never Become Indifferent toward Our Spiritual Practices and Faith Consider the adage that familiarity breeds contempt. While I hope that our familiarity with God will never breed contempt toward our Creator and Savior, I do wonder if our familiarity breeds complacency, that is a smug indifference or even apathy toward our faith. Recall […]
Sheba Leads a Rebellion Against David After Absalom’s coup attempt to take over his father’s throne is squelched, a troublemaker tries to lead a rebellion against David. Here’s what happens: When Absalom takes David’s throne, David and his entourage flee the city. Safely away, his army fights against Absalom’s army. When Joab kills Absalom, his […]
Forgive and be Forgiven As followers of Jesus, we shouldn’t judge others, but we do. Too often, we judge Christians for their theology. We must stop. When we evaluate others based on what they believe, we diminish them in the process. And we smugly elevate ourselves over them. When we do this, our egos show […]
God Created Us to Work, So Don’t Stop I’ve worked from home since 2000. That’s a long time, and I doubt I could ever return to a more typical workplace environment. Through most of this time, neighbors would ask if I had retired. (How old did they think I was, anyway?) I’d smile and tell […]