For you are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there …
Created Equal?
Once upon a time, there was a man sitting quietly by a pool of water. He was a very sick man, and doubted that he had very long to live. While he stared into the …
Jeremiah #20
I heard someone say once, I have had a lot of bad things in my life, most of which never happened. He was trying to say that a lot of the things we worry about …
One Person at a Time
View PostJeremiah #19
I’m sure you realize that there are a lot of prophets scattered around the world—people who claim to speak for God, to foretell the future? Except for a few cult members, no one ever takes …
Jeremiah #18
How many enemies can you make in 23 years of speaking the truth to power? Jeremiah has now been telling it like it is for 23 years and through parts of the reigns of two …
Jeremiah #17
One of the things we depend on is that God is not fickle. He isn’t one way today and another way tomorrow. He doesn’t have one standard today and another tomorrow. He doesn’t have one …
The Life & Teachings of Paul #12 - Galatians
I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ lives in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of …
Jesus and the Last Days
Predicting what is going to happen next in the Middle East is a fool’s game…or maybe perhaps a prophet’s task. Not being a prophet, and trying not to be a fool, it still seems necessary …
Jeremiah #16
I think a man’s life before God can deteriorate in stages. As he passes through those stages, his options narrow. Suppose there is a man who regularly abuses alcohol and drives his car after he’s …
Jeremiah #15
One of the most persistent, nagging questions that dogs the Christian faith is called theodicy—the defense of God’s goodness and omnipotence in view of the existence of evil. If God is good and all-powerful, how …
Jeremiah #14
I am sitting here reading a document that is 2,600 years old. It reads like the memoirs of man who had an ongoing dialogue with God. Chances are, you have a copy of this same …
Jeremiah #13
Sometimes I understand why people don’t like to read the Old Testament prophets. They have an internal image of God as a kind of Grandfather in the sky. It is very comforting to them. And …
The Life & Teachings of Paul #11 - Galatians
Paul’s epistle to the Galatians may be the most controversial book in the New Testament. It’s been studied, it’s been talked about, it’s been argued about for generations. In fact, there are indications in the …
A Christian Ideal
It is a small national conceit that Freedom is an American idea. Nor does Freedom owe its origins to the Greeks, either. Freedom is a singular Christian idea. I can say Christian because the roots …
Jeremiah #12
As I read through Jeremiah, I sometimes get the feeling that I’m reading his memoirs. Yes, there are things that he has said, speeches he has spoken. Yes, there are the things that God has …
Jeremiah #11
Would you like to be prophet? The prophets of old had to do some really strange things from time to time. It wasn’t enough for them to just speak the words, sometimes they had to …
Jeremiah #10
Can God feel disappointment? I know, many believe in the impassibility of God. They believe that God is, by definition of the word, impassable—incapable of suffering or of experiencing pain. You can read the prophets …
Jeremiah #9
Is it really possible for a man to know God? Can a man understand God, or is it just really too high for us? To be sure, there are things about God that are a …
The Life & Teachings of Paul #10 - Thessalonians
And then shall that Wicked One be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the breath of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming: Even him, whose coming is after the …
The Design
I have to see my eye doctor three times a year, and I am always left waiting in his examination room. The walls there are covered with pictures and diagrams of the human eye. I …
The First of Weeks
We have long taken special interest in those eight scriptures that speak of the “first day of the week”. We have made the point that if authority for Sunday observance is to be found anywhere …
Passover at Home
View PostIf Not Christmas, What?
Jesus was not born on December 25. On the evening of Jesus’ birth, there were shepherds abiding in the fields, keeping watch over their flocks by night. Shepherds, they tell us, would not have been …
Feast of Trumpets: Judgment Day
As I live, saith the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess to God. So then every one of us shall give account of himself to God. Romans 14:11–12 KJV …
The Resurrection
For since by man came death, by Man also came the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive. 1 Corinthians 15:21-22 Even if …
Church Music: Blessing or Burden?
Maybe I shouldn’t be so critical of contemporary church music. After all, even Johann Sebastian Bach was reprimanded by his pastor for his “modern music”. Bach was criticized, not because his music was bad, but …
Why Do You Believe What You Believe?
Where did you get your beliefs? Can you remember your first ideas about God, or how old you were when you first became aware of the existence of God? Maybe you remember praying as a …
An Uneasy Thanksgiving
As I sit down to my Thanksgiving dinner this year, one of the things I am thankful for is that we still have Thanksgiving Day. And I find myself mildly surprised that we still do. …
Saving the World
On the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink. He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has …
The Day of Atonement
For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life. And not only so, but we also …
Trumpets and the Resurrection
Behold, I tell you a mystery: We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed; in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, …
Is There Life After Divorce?
“Let none be faithless to the wife of his youth. For I hate divorce, says the Lord the God of Israel.” Divorce is painful. If you have been through a divorce, you need no one …
Baptized with Fire
And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall …
The Body of Christ
The Lord Jesus on the same night in which He was betrayed took bread; and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, “Take, eat; this is My body which is broken for …
Tracks of the Devil
If you were in the forest and were looking for evidence that a particular kind of animal lived in the area, you would look for the unique signs and tracks that would tell you the …
An Anxious Faith
And straightway the father of the child cried out, and said with tears, Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief. Mark 9:24 Jennifer’s husband was going into the hospital on Monday for open heart surgery. …
Could Christ Return Tonight?
View PostGoverning Sheep
What is the shape of a flock of sheep? This probably belongs on a list of the world’s most meaningless questions, for a flock of sheep has no shape. It is a collection of living …
The Life & Teachings of Paul #13 - Galatians
For you are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there …
Created Equal?
Once upon a time, there was a man sitting quietly by a pool of water. He was a very sick man, and doubted that he had very long to live. While he stared into the …
Jeremiah #20
I heard someone say once, I have had a lot of bad things in my life, most of which never happened. He was trying to say that a lot of the things we worry about …
One Person at a Time
View PostJeremiah #19
I’m sure you realize that there are a lot of prophets scattered around the world—people who claim to speak for God, to foretell the future? Except for a few cult members, no one ever takes …
Jeremiah #18
How many enemies can you make in 23 years of speaking the truth to power? Jeremiah has now been telling it like it is for 23 years and through parts of the reigns of two …
Jeremiah #17
One of the things we depend on is that God is not fickle. He isn’t one way today and another way tomorrow. He doesn’t have one standard today and another tomorrow. He doesn’t have one …
The Life & Teachings of Paul #12 - Galatians
I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ lives in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of …
Jesus and the Last Days
Predicting what is going to happen next in the Middle East is a fool’s game…or maybe perhaps a prophet’s task. Not being a prophet, and trying not to be a fool, it still seems necessary …
Jeremiah #16
I think a man’s life before God can deteriorate in stages. As he passes through those stages, his options narrow. Suppose there is a man who regularly abuses alcohol and drives his car after he’s …
Jeremiah #15
One of the most persistent, nagging questions that dogs the Christian faith is called theodicy—the defense of God’s goodness and omnipotence in view of the existence of evil. If God is good and all-powerful, how …
Jeremiah #14
I am sitting here reading a document that is 2,600 years old. It reads like the memoirs of man who had an ongoing dialogue with God. Chances are, you have a copy of this same …
Jeremiah #13
Sometimes I understand why people don’t like to read the Old Testament prophets. They have an internal image of God as a kind of Grandfather in the sky. It is very comforting to them. And …
The Life & Teachings of Paul #11 - Galatians
Paul’s epistle to the Galatians may be the most controversial book in the New Testament. It’s been studied, it’s been talked about, it’s been argued about for generations. In fact, there are indications in the …
A Christian Ideal
It is a small national conceit that Freedom is an American idea. Nor does Freedom owe its origins to the Greeks, either. Freedom is a singular Christian idea. I can say Christian because the roots …
Jeremiah #12
As I read through Jeremiah, I sometimes get the feeling that I’m reading his memoirs. Yes, there are things that he has said, speeches he has spoken. Yes, there are the things that God has …
Jeremiah #11
Would you like to be prophet? The prophets of old had to do some really strange things from time to time. It wasn’t enough for them to just speak the words, sometimes they had to …
Jeremiah #10
Can God feel disappointment? I know, many believe in the impassibility of God. They believe that God is, by definition of the word, impassable—incapable of suffering or of experiencing pain. You can read the prophets …
Jeremiah #9
Is it really possible for a man to know God? Can a man understand God, or is it just really too high for us? To be sure, there are things about God that are a …
The Life & Teachings of Paul #10 - Thessalonians
And then shall that Wicked One be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the breath of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming: Even him, whose coming is after the …