"Watch your life and doctrine closely"
For years I sat a few pews back from Mrs. Maggie every Sunday morning. I would walk into the auditorium, and she’d already be in the front row with a smile on her face and her portable breathing machine next to her. I’d lean over her walker to hug her while she said in her…
Technology is advancing faster than parents can keep up. Every new gadget promises new opportunities, but also provides dangers and temptations. Here is a list of resources to help you navigate such difficult questions, provide accountability, and protect your children. Filters/Accountability Software: Canopy– Creates a VPN that monitors all activity on your device (including text…
I had recently become a pastor in a new town and wanted to meet some church members living in the local nursing home. I walked through the doors and immediately heard the TV in the lobby blaring loudly. Some residents slept on the couch while others rested comfortably in their wheelchairs watching “Wheel of Fortune.”…
Human beings are people of extremes. The pages of history give testimony to our ability to diagnose a problem and then overcorrect to an opposite error. Children raised under the pressures of legalism often gravitate toward licentiousness. Reacting against an overemphasis in logic, some have gone to the opposite error of relative truth. The church…
Everyone seems so busy in our fast-paced society. There’s always more work to do or places to go. We fill our calendars with appointments and tasks while marveling at our administration skills. We complain about our lack of rest but we seem more afraid of down time, and the threat of burn-out always looms. God…
Sometimes a specific moment hits you hard. Maybe while playing with your kids and hearing them giggle and squeal with laughter you are immediately struck with a deep gratitude. Your whole life seems to flash before your eyes in an instant and you can’t imagine ending up in a better situation than here in this…
The hardest part of preaching is living. I can’t stand before God’s people and proclaim God’s Word without being painfully aware that I’m a wretched sinner. How can I teach others when I don’t have it figured out myself? Why should someone listen to my exhortation to Christlikeness when I fall so far from it?…
It was the strangest of times, it was the most frustrating of times. How else could one revise Dickens’ famous opening line to describe our current cultural era? Foundational ideas and understandings are changing at lightening pace. The majority opinion from twenty years ago regarding marriage is now viewed as oppressive and unwelcome in public…
I wipe the sweat from my forehead with my dirty hands as I look with a feeling of accomplishment. In the ground before me is a small square of tilled up dirt that, Lord willing, will soon flourish with green plants bearing delicious tomatoes, watermelon, cucumbers, green beans, and many other healthy vegetables for my…
We call the lion “The King of the Jungle” for a reason. Its speed, strength, and stalking abilities strike fear into the rest of the animal kingdom. However, many of its prey are larger or faster, forcing the lion to compensate for these disadvantages through strategy and patience. Generally, it’s the lionesses who hunt to…