A few thoughts about “The Fall”

I wrote the following for a “Scripture Meditation” in my theology class and thought I’d share it with y’all…

Genesis 3 is a gold mine of information about humanity – if only we would listen to it!  In this, the true account of the fall of man, we see many things:  the nature of temptation, the Deceiver and his tricks, the shame associated with sin, the results of the manipulation of God’s words, and more.  I find it particularly interesting that the serpent insisted that God did not want Eve to know “good and evil”.  Was evil a category Eve could

Thoughts on “Hello World” by Lady Antebellum

Having done a few song reviews in the last month, I thought I would continue with a very popular song, albeit in a category of music that usually falls in the “I love it” camp or “I hate it camp”.  That category?  Country music of course!  Few people remain without an opinion about country music.  Oddly enough, I started

Faith’s Great Enemy: Cynicism Part 2

As I stated in part 1, cynicism is something each of us deals with personally and is a pandemic in both church and society as a whole.  One thing to add to all that has been said already is that cynicism is more than a feeling:  cynicism is the result of believing lies from Satan.  By creating a cynical spirit all around us, Satan is able to get us to believe God can’t be as good as the Bible says he is, he can’t love me since bad things have happened to me, and he won’t act on my behalf with what I am struggling with.  Cynicism is

Faith’s Great Enemy: Cynicism part 1

Cynicism.  Suspicion.  Doubt.  These are the kinds of words that betray faith and hope.  In large part, they are the “spirit of the age” in America.  In less than 50 years, for example, the role of “pastor” or church leader has gone from one of the most respected positions in society to one of the most despised and disdained.  It is no longer seen in a largely positive light.  In fact, I’ve found that one of the quickest ways to kill a budding conversation with a stranger at a party was to answer the common question

Image As Presence – Or, Maps, Flags, and Presidents

“…being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator.”  Colossians 3:10

The concept of humans as the image of God (Imago Dei) is one I’ve known to be important for a long time.  But, it’s also one I’ve understood very little about and thought very little about as well.  It usually comes up in the abortion debate – someone throws down as some kind of trump card “Don’t you know the fetus is still in the image of God just like us?” with the theory being

Making It Home

Portland is starting to feel like home for us.  We just had two of our closest friends, Taylor and Brittany Lawrence, visit us for 5 days.  Taylor is getting hired on with the Corvallis, OR Police Department sometime in March so they were up here looking at places to live.  Oh, and Brittany is pregnant!  So cool… but tons of change coming for them soon.  New state to live in, new career to start for Taylor, and a child on the way – awesome, but

Hoisting My Sails

I’m reading one of the classics on spiritual disciplines for one of my classes:  Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian life, by Donald Whitney.  Regrettably, I did not read the one chapter per day I had planned, in order to finish it in two weeks, and have found myself reading several chapters a day in order to finish it by Thursday morning for class.  There is much to be gained from this book, and much more that I could gain still had I been reading it slower.  But, alas, I’m doing

Words Are Like Containers



Recently in my theology class, Dr. Breshears took the time to compare and contrast common words looking at how they are typically used in America and how the Bible uses them.  He gave a very helpful analogy when thinking about words:  words are like containers – it’s what you fill them with that counts.  What in the world does that mean?  It means

Confessions, Book One: Restless Hearts Resting in God

“…for thou hast made us for thyself and restless is our heart until it comes to rest in thee”

Augustine’s Confession is a monumental work, a work which has impacted millions and left a permanent mark on Christianity.  It is certainly not anywhere near equal to Scripture, but it has been used by God in spectacular ways to help us understand God’s character and ways that are talked about in Scripture.  In the book, Augustine is seeking to “confess” his whole life before God, and confess the

Confused about Parables? This may help!

Have you had big time trouble understanding Jesus’ parables?  Mark Driscoll gives a good framework in this video for how to read parables and understand their meaning.  As Mark says, many people abuse parables or just altogether dismiss them because they don’t understand the importance of them.  Hopefully this is helpful to you as it was to me!

How to Interpret Jesus’ Parables