MMA: How Does Your Spouse Approach New Ideas?

Have you ever stumbled into an argument with your spouse?  Perhaps you planned on just mentioning something about what you’ve read or learned recently and it turned into an emotionally charged talk about your whole life together.  This happened recently with Noelle and I, and it got me thinking about some good ways to make sure small arguments don’t escalate into long term bitterness and resentment.

The other night Noelle and I were

Is God’s Kingdom Upside Down… Or Is Ours?

Is The Kingdom of God an “upside down kingdom”?  The first shall be last… let everyone who wants to be great be the servant of all… let him become a fool that he may become wise.  Or, perhaps it is us in our little kingdoms that are actually upside down?  Perhaps, rather than seeing the Kingdom as the strange way to live, we should be seeing our current world as strange, and God’s Kingdom as normal?

Yes, perhaps this is the best way to look at things.  If sin truly is rampant everywhere, and it is, it is akin to

The Fullness Of Things

My message at the most recent wedding I officiated was about fulfillment.  And it was probably not what you think – it wasn’t about “how to find fulfillment in your marriage.”  It was actually about how to find the fullness of things for which we were all created.  Rather than Christianity taking its cues from the cultural obsession with “fulfillment”, I believe we need to be discussing the bigger issue:  what were we created for, how was it lost, and how do we get it back?

 

We were created for

The Gospel Of… Oprah?

That’s a wrap folks.  After 25 years Oprah is hanging up her heels and walking away from the stage.  Her show has aired in 150 countries to millions of people, five times a week for over two decades.  Her influence is literally hard to fathom… as is her wealth.

Having paid little attention to Oprah over the years, I thought it would make sense to watch her final show.  Why, you ask?  I’ll tell you why: 

The Romance of Redemption, part 2

In part 1, I recapped the story of Ruth and hopefully encouraged you with the truth that nothing catches God by surprise.  In this post I want to reflect on some things from “The Romance of Redemption” series by pastor/professor Art Azurdia that has had me thinking about God’s goodness and his amazing redemption.

First, God is

The Romance of Redemption, Part 1

There are many ways to explain the gospel, and many words that sum up well the work of God to save us from our sins.  One key word used in the Bible is redemption.  God is our Redeemer, the One who has acted in human history through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ to free us from slavery to sin and death and given us life in Jesus.  While the facts of redemption are great, I want to write about something known as “The Romance of Redemption.”

No story more profoundly demonstrates redemption in the Old Testament than

I Don’t Believe The Whole Gospel

The older I get and the longer I am a Christian one thing becomes more and more clear to me:  I don’t really believe the whole gospel.  There are always parts of it and applications of the gospel that I flat out don’t believe.  If I did believe the whole gospel, why did I not obey the prompting from the Spirit a few minutes ago to share Christ with the two homeless guys outside of Starbucks?

In his book Spiritual Formation As If The Church Mattered, James Whilhoit writes

Weddings And Ultimate Things

This past weekend was a great one for me, as it was an opportunity to officiate a wedding for a couple that God brought together in seriously amazing ways.  Gabe and Christy are mature believers whom I admire a great deal, and their wedding was a testimony to God’s faithfulness, grace, and… quirky timing.

Gabe and Christy met at a

Sunday School on Steroids: Jesus and The 5000

The story of Jesus feeding the 5000 is among the most well known Sunday School stories of all time.  Does anyone else remember the flannel graphs with the rolling hills and Jesus with his perfectly manicured flowing hair multiplying all that food?  While those were good times, I read something recently in a great book called A Meal With Jesus by Tim Chester that has given me a new appreciation for the story.

First, we need to set up the scene

My Take On The Adjustment Bureau

The Adjustment Bureau had some insightful ways of describing the relationship of God and humanity to the ideas of fate and free will.  While much of the theology (and trust me, this was a primarily theological movie) falls short of the truth, it is still worth watching – if nothing else to know the impact it may have on many people.  Here I give my perspective some of my own questions…

How does the character of the Chairperson differ from the character of God as he is revealed in the Bible?