When Paul writes to the church in the city of Colossi, he says he always gives God thanks when he prays for them. He doesn’t just give God thanks for them occasionally but always. This is because of their faith in Jesus and their love for all God’s people—not some of them or the ones […]
Sunday Should Not Be a Day of Restriction but a Day of Freedom and Celebration In the book of Exodus, God and Moses have a face-to-face meeting. That is significant. How cool would it be to have a direct conversation with the Almighty? Certainly, we’d remember what he told us and be careful to follow […]
Consider the Fruit You Bear as a Follower of Jesus Paul tells the church in Galatia that the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Galatians 5:22-23). When we follow Jesus and the Holy Spirit resides in us, this should result in changed behavior, a better behavior […]
The Bible Tells Us to Live a Life of Contentment Though some people in our world struggle to have the basic requirements for life, many others enjoy an existence that meets all their needs and beyond. This is a given for many people in most developed nations. They don’t need to seek God for their […]
God Cares for the Lesser Things of His Creation and We Are So Much More In one of Asaph’s Psalms he exalts God for his power, beauty, and perfection. In doing so Asaph envisions what God might say to his people, talking about what is important and what isn’t. God has no need for our […]
Consider These Passages about God’s Provisions for Us Over the past few weeks, I’ve shared verses with my friends through my email newsletter. These passages can encourage us during challenging times. And readers have responded by sending me their verses that they find especially helpful in the world today. Here’s the list of these verses. […]
Take Time to Tell God What You’re Thankful For on Thanksgiving and Every Other Day Too The church I attended several years ago had a Thanksgiving practice of having members stand to share what they were thankful for. From my perspective this never went well, with too much silence or too much forced sharing and […]
As Moses prepares the Israelites to enter into the land God promised them, he reminds them of God’s instructions. Moses looks forward to the time when the people will live in cities they didn’t build, drink from wells they didn’t dig, and eat from fields they didn’t plant. They will be satisfied and he warns […]
When it comes to praising God, I like to praise him for who he is and thank him for what he does—most of the time. Sometimes, though, I just don’t feel like it. Intellectually, nothing’s changed; spiritually, he’s the same, but emotionally, I don’t want to. What do I do in those cases? I praise […]
It’s not good to dwell in the past or fixate on what was, but it is wise to periodically review it. As we recently transitioned from one year to the next, my wife and I spent time with close friends. We recalled our personal highs and lows from the year that was ending. For those […]