Disunity Today Hurts the Cause of Jesus In our consideration of words that appear only in the New Testament, we come across Pharisees and Sadducees. Two related words are Zealot and Nazarene, along with Essene. Pharisees Appearing ninety-nine times in the New Testament, the Pharisees receive the most attention. They were a righteous group of […]
At a meeting, someone mentioned “the Acts 15 experience.” Everyone else seemed to comprehend the reference, so I chose to not interrupt by asking for an explanation. Since then I’ve read Acts 15 and searched online for answers. (An online search provided only a handful of matches, which weren’t helpful.) As I contemplate this, I’ve […]
Jesus Welcomed and Embraced Everyone, Especially Those on the Fringes Have you ever gone to a new place where people warmly welcomed and embraced you? A place where people warmly welcomed and embraced everyone? It’s not the location that matters. It’s the people. I’ve been in groups like this. Everyone’s accepted as they are. They […]
Our Actions and Our Words Determine Our Reputation In the post “They’ll know we are Christians by our love” we talked about the importance of our Christian witness. This is best accomplished by our love and our unity. Unfortunately, the world rarely sees our love and unity. Instead we model hate and disagreement. That’s what […]
Followers of Jesus Should Carefully Consider the Message We Send to the World A song from my youth carries the title, which repeats in the chorus, “They’ll know we are Christians by our love.” If you’re not familiar with this song, check out the lyrics or watch a video. Though not the style of music […]
Changing Churches Should Be Rare In our Facebook group we discussed the post “When Not to Change Churches.” Justin asked a pertinent question: “When should you change churches?” I knew part of the answer, but I needed to contemplate how far to take my response. Part of my hesitation stemmed from the reality that sometimes […]
Ecumenical Is a Word Some May Be Unfamiliar With One definition of ecumenical means “relating to the worldwide Christian church.” A broader understanding is “establishing and promoting unity among religions.” More generically, ecumenical simply means “worldwide; universal.” In simple terms, I understand ecumenical to mean unifying. So that means ecumenical guidelines are advice to unify us. […]
From my research for 52 Churches I learned a great deal about the larger faith community I’m part of. This includes having charismatic experiences at some of the churches. Perhaps the most significant so far is courtesy of the United Methodist Church and their document “Guidelines: The United Methodist Church and the Charismatic Movement.” It’s […]
There is an amazing little booklet, sporting a tongue-twister of a title. It is The Threefold Art of Experiencing God: The Liberating Power of a Trinitarian Faith by Christian A. Schwarz. In a stellar example of “less is more,” this diminutive book carries a profound punch. Facets of Faith The central theme is that Christianity […]
Christianity Today recently reported that there are 42,000 Protestant denominations. That is shocking. However, given that in the United States we have a consumerism mentality, this development is hardly surprising. Consumerism says that if you don’t like the church you are at, you keep shopping until you find one. If you can’t find one that […]