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Self-Love and the Cross
âLearning to love yourself, this is the greatest love of all.â Those words are from the song The Greatest Love of All written by Linda Creed and Michael Messer. Itât been around long enough to probably be classified as an oldie. Whitney Houston rocked this song with her amazing voice in 1985. This songâs words resonated with a lot of people, here are a few of the key concepts : I believe that children are our future, Teach them well and let them lead the way, Show the all the beauty they possess inside, GIve them a sense of pride to make it easier Let the childrenâs laughter remind us…
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The Search for Perfect Church
Church-hopping or even becoming a ânon-attenderâ has become common. I hear many who do this defending their decision by criticizing the imperfections of the church or churches they have tried out. Perhaps the worship is too dull and unenthusiastic. Or it is too spirited and alarming. Are there hypocrites, cliques, or politics going on? What about sexual sin? We find a lot of reasons to be critical of churchâand there is perhaps an unexamined assumption in our quest for what we might term the âperfect church.â Letâs see what the Word has to say about all of that. Worst. Church. Ever. The church at Corinth was located in the epicenter…
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Why First Person Messiah?
My new book First Person Messiah has been well-receivedâbut Iâm getting some questions about it. One of the main questions is, âWhat made you think about writing this way?â To be truthfulâit was what I call a âHoly Spirit Audible.â I was leading a Sunday morning Bible class called Seeing Jesus, Walking With. It was early in the series and I had a lesson stressing the need to accept that perhaps because of our histories in churches and various teachings, we might have a skewed view of who Yeshua of Nazareth was and is. I had worked up a lesson outline to present on a Sunday in which I attempted…
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Rejoice Always, Really?
So the Apostle Paul is problematic. He says things like âPray without ceasingâ and âgive thanks in all circumstances.â (I Thes. 5:17) As I said in an earlier article about the âpray without ceasingâ admonishment from the same textâthis one is a bit difficult. Okay, itâs a whole lot difficult. Life gets really toughâthere is sorrow, suffering, loss, anxiety, and loads of stress for just about everyone. It seems in certain seasons of life all of these just mount up all at once and life gets grueling. Paul tells us to ârejoice always?â Really? God Wants You to Be Happy? Iâve heard a lot of folks say (especially doing the…
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Pray Without Ceasing? Really?
So. yeah, the Bible says to âpray without ceasingâ (1 Thess. 5:17). For the longest time I thought that was sort of metaphorical. What Paul the Apostle really meant was âpray regularlyâ or âpray a lot.â Not any more. Paul was on to something vital to our spiritual formationâsomething profound andâŚbeautiful. We can and should âpray without ceasing,â but the reason why I thought is was metaphorical is because of some basic misunderstandings about some really important realities. The Nervous Pray-er I learned what I initially learned about prayer mainly from watching men at church lead public prayer. Way back in the 90sâ I had a group of young friends…
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The Need for a Spiritual Reset, Part II
In Part I, we discussed how sometimes when things arenât going well in just about any area of life, we could benefit from a reset. This is especially true in spiritual matters. While many have identified problems amongst the people of God, the suggested solutions are often unbiblical and not helpful in advancing the kingdom of God. I left our discussion last time with a tease about what the Spirit informed me when I was asked to preach on the topic of âDoes the Church Need to Change?â His answer was, âYes.â What needed to change? What did the guy who taught others how to initiate and sustain conversations, to…
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Spiritual Reset? Could be GoodâŚ
âHoney, my computer is doing this weird thing, itâs really slow and this window keeps popping up,â said my lovely wife on the phone. I was 1,600 miles away on a trip, being asked to fix a computer I couldnât see. At some point my advice was âturn it off and then back on again.â In other words, reset. I was doing the preflight inspection on a McDonell Douglas MD-11. We were getting all sorts of strange warnings on cockpit displays and nothing seemed to remedy it. We called the mechanics, they saw all the confusing indications and decided to âtake all the power off and then back on again.â…
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Yeah, What Moses SaidâŚ
Iâm embarrassed to admit it, but it took me a long time to notice something. There is one Psalm in the Bible that was written byâŚwait for itâŚMoses himself. I know, heâs just a person like you or me, but he is so central to the Bible story. In his faithfulness to God he saved his nationâand thereby played a huge role in bringing my Savior into the world. Moses is cool. Of course, in the spirit of âall have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,â (Rom. 3:23) he was also a hot mess. To save his own bacon he claims his beautiful wife was his sister…
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Revival, the Spirit, and Your Spirit, Part II
Why I Am Concerned for Our Young Revivalists In part one of this blog series, we talked about the challenges of understanding how the Holy Spirit works as the Scripture instructs us, and one of the cultural reasons why we should pray King Davidâs prayer and beg that God would ââŚ.try me and know my thoughts. And see if there be any grievous way in meâŚâ (Ps. 139:23). That reason is narcissismâfor we live in an incredibly self-promoting time. Self-promotion is so common now that we hardly notice it. Are we participating in ârevivalâ for the advancement of Godâs Kingdom, or for our own image? In Part II, however, I…
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Why Do Superhero Movies Appeal Today?
The Reason Behind My New Book Superhero: Being Who God Says You Are Isnât it strange when someone claims to believe something strongly, but the entirety of their life demonstrates this claim to be untrue? While an increasing majority of people around us claim to believe in moral relativism, autonomous individualism, narcissistic hedonism, and reductive naturalismâthe most popular superhero movies go completely against these claimed values. The question is, why? Can I tell you that the reason why is an encouraging spiritual reality that can ignite your passion to live as the person God intends you to be? Letâs unpack our friends and neighbors tension between their claimed values and…
