Camping on the Wrong Side of the Jordan
“Early in the morning Joshua and all the Israelites set out from Shittim and went to the Jordan, where they camped before crossing over …. 5 Joshua told the people, “Consecrate yourselves, for tomorrow the LORD will do amazing things among you.” Joshua 3: 1, 5 The leader of the women’s ministry at my new church talked about this verse at a Bible study last weekend, and what she said has stuck with me. We can’t know the frame of mind of the Israelites as they camped their last few nights in the wilderness. But peppered throughout the book of Joshua are the instructions “Be strong and courageous.” You don’t need to be admonished to do those things if you’re not in the least afraid or uncertain. So chances are, they...
Aborting Providence
Decisions, even small ones, can have vast and unintended consequences. Like a secret agent on a mission, one errant decision can cause the whole plan to unravel calling for everyone involved to “abort the mission” because circumstances have changed and success is no longer possible. My daughter has been given a few responsibilities around the house. For this she gets an allowance of $1.25 per week, and included in these responsibilities is the daily task of feeding the dogs and checking to make sure they have water. Should she fail to feed the dogs even once during the week, she forfeits her allowance for the entire week. Some may see this as a bit heavy handed, but I am trying to teach her consistency in self-discipline, and the idea that...
Being a speed bump to the Gospel
So I have had the great pleasure / heavy responsibility of teaching my first adult Sunday School class this spring, and it has been eye-opening to say the least. First, as an aside, I have so much more respect and honor for pastors that prepare sermons every week. It is a fairly stressful ordeal of realizing that you are putting words around the truth of Scripture and the Gospel. <church comedy start> I mean honestly pastors should get 5 to 10 mulligans a year where they say, “Look other than the Scripture of this sermon, the rest is likely to suck and I am sorry. I am claiming one of my mulligans” <church comedy end>. So this leads me to think about my class. I am teaching on Heaven which is a subject that I am wildly passionate...
Can You Hate Religion and Love Jesus?
Take a look at this video first . . . After watching the video myself, all I could think of is how many people I personally know won’t have a clue what to do with this video. I read a website where the writer respectfully picked it apart without understanding the perspective I believe Mr. Bethke comes from, which is one of “be” not “do” when it comes to our faith in Christ, and our relationship with God. To really understand why people do not like the video “for reasons they cannot fully articulate” you need to understand their perspective. They are probably coming from a place in their life where all they have known as church has been a building they go to three times a week, including Sunday school, to learn about...
Humility
For Christmas I got myself a book on humility, because I figured it was something I really needed. It will be a slow and difficult read, but a good one. Here is the opening paragraph: “In Paradise there are many Saints who never gave alms on earth; their poverty justified them. There are many Saints who never mortified their bodies by fasting or wearing hair shirts; their bodily infirmities excused them. There are many Saints too who were not virgins; their vocation was otherwise. But in Paradise there is no Saint who was not Humble.” (from Humility of Hear by Fr. Cajetan Mary da Bergamo Whether or not I learn much from the rest of this book, I suppose I would do well to reflect on this paragraph every little while.
Dear Heavenly Father
I was only fourteen years old when the man who fathered me walked out the front door of our house, never to return as “dad” again. By the time I was 18 years old I was pretty sure I’d never go to church again, and if I ever did, it would only be to make my kids go because back then I just felt “church is for kids” and there wasn’t anything about the Bible anyone could teach me that I didn’t already know. Today, I am married with two children, and God is a greater part of my life than He has ever been before, yet still the past haunted me. My father was verbally and physically abusive, and for years I have asked the questions many people ask about how God could allow such things to happen. Sometimes I come across some truth that...
What fruit?
I read this today: Luke 3 And he told this parable: “A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it and found none.7 And he said to the vinedresser, ‘Look, for three years now I have come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none. Cut it down. Why should it use up the ground?’ 8 And he answered him, ‘Sir, let it alone this year also, until I dig around it and put on manure. 9 Then if it should bear fruit next year, well and good; but if not, you can cut it down.’” (ESV) As I was reading this parable a couple of things occurred to me. The first is that the tree isn’t expected to bear fruit without the work of the vinedresser. The second is that there seems to be a limit to how long the master...