Remember now your Creator in the days of your youth, while the evil days come not, nor the years draw near, when you shall say, I have no pleasure in them; While the sun, or …
Why Marriage Matters
I was driving by a church one day just as a wedding was ending. The bride and groom had emerged and the crowd was throwing rice (or birdseed) at the happy pair. I momentarily found …
Christian Origins #84 - Hebrews
When you get on an airplane to go somewhere, do you have faith that you are going to get where you are going? Sure you do. If you didn’t, you wouldn’t get on the airplane. …
Christian Origins #83 - Hebrews
One of the most puzzling things about the Bible, at least to the modern mind, is animal sacrifice. Why kill an animal because you have done something wrong? I used to wonder why God couldn’t …
Christian Origins #82 - Hebrews
One of the strangest revelations in the Book of Hebrews is that the Tabernacle that Israel carried around the wilderness was a model of something that existed in Heaven. And not only that, but that …
Christian Origins #81 - Hebrews
It is tempting to think of religious ritual and ceremony as so much mumbo-jumbo that means next to nothing. Especially if it was done in a language you didn’t even understand. As a stranger who …
The Book of Ecclesiastes #5
There was a little city, and few men within it; and there came a great king against it, and besieged it, and built great bulwarks against it: Now there was found in it a poor …
Understanding Deception
Consider a strange irony: Almost every religious deception known to man has been introduced by warning its audience against deception. I have seen many strange religious ideas; and most of them cite, somewhere in the …
Christian Origins #80 - Hebrews
I know this is going to sound crazy. And it is going to be hard to explain why it should be so. But the entire structure of the worship of God in the Old Testament …
Christian Origins #79 - Hebrews
Is it possible that sometime in your life you have encountered God and didn’t even know it? The writer of Hebrews tells us to [b]e not forgetful to entertain strangers: for thereby some have entertained …
Christian Origins #78 - Hebrews
Of all the things we know about God, one of the most disconcerting is that there is no place to hide from him. But let me put your mind at rest on something. God is …
Christian Origins #77 - Hebrews
One of the greatest pieces of symbolism in all the Bible is the Jordan River. It has captured the imagination of hymn-writers and theologians, generation after generation. When I was growing up, my father sang …
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 …
Preparing for Pentecost
View PostThe Book of Ecclesiastes #4
All the labor of man is for his mouth, and yet the appetite is not filled. For what has the wise more than the fool? what has the poor, who knows to walk before the …
Christian Holidays #9
Of all the Christian holidays, the one that surprises me the most is Pentecost. It surprises me that every Christian does not observe it. After all, it is the birthday of the New Testament church. …
Christian Origins #76 - Hebrews
Who was Jesus, anyway? Was he really God? Or was he just an angel in the flesh? Or was he even flesh? We know he was the son of God, but is that literal, or …
Christian Origins #75 - Titus
No matter how you slice it, a church is, always has been, and always will be a political institution. And let me be sure you understand what I mean by political. The word has to …
Christian Origins #74 - 1 Timothy
What happened to old people in this country before Social Security? Did a lot of them starve to death? Did they get sick and die alone with no one to look after them? I ask …
Christian Origins #73 - 1 Timothy
Do you suppose it is possible that you could be deceived? Religiously, I mean. The answer ought to be evident, because every one of us has been snookered at one time or another. We have …