Church Blog (Page 18)

Spoiler Alert

I don’t like for someone to tell me how a movie ends before I watch it, and I’d never read the last chapter of a book before I’d read the rest. So I hope I’m not spoiling the end for you when I let you in on a Bible secret. We win. Big. Or maybe I should say, “God wins . . . so we do too.” He’s dropped some huge hints along the way . . . here’s one…

Are You Righteous?

The word righteous means “to act in a way that’s morally right and wise.” In James chapter 5, we read about the “prayer of a righteous person.” This prayer, James said, “has great power as it is working. My first thought is that I want to be righteous! I want to be able to pray powerful prayers. But, am I righteous? Sometimes, I pray with doubts. Not doubts in God, but doubts in myself. My prayers sometimes focus more on…

Your Weak Spot

What’s your weak spot? You’ve got one, of course, as we all do, and Satan knows exactly where it is. He’s lurking around, watching, waiting, looking for us to let our guards down, then he attacks. One thing that makes it so difficult is that he often uses something in us that’s harmless. He takes a good desire and makes it bad. Here’s Eve’s tragic mistake: So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that…

What happened to Jesus at the Cross?

I don’t pretend to understand exactly what happened, but I think it may have been the Lord’s most terrifying and difficult moment of the six-hour crucifixion. It’s the only saying from the cross that Mark records: And when the sixth hour had come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour. And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?” which means, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” And…

And having scourged Jesus

The flogging scene in The Passion of the Christ portrays the brutality of the beating Jesus endured more graphically than anything I’ve seen. It must’ve been awful, yet the gospel writers mention it only in passing, it seems. Here’s Mark’s account: “. . . and having scourged Jesus, he delivered him to be crucified” (Mark 15:15b). His description leaves me wanting more. He was scourged? What does that mean? How bad was it? Mark’s readers probably needed no explanation; they knew what…

Pure Hearts

If you have kids who are older than 11, they’ve watched pornography online, at least if they meet the national average. This is one area where we want our kids to be below average. A new porn video is produced in the United States every 39 minutes, and $100 billion will be spent on pornography this year. The world is as scary as it’s ever been, but it’s not just out there. It’s in here too, pretty close to home.…

Eat Better

The cliché “You are what you eat” has some basis in fact, it seems, or at least that’s what the nutritionists say. Eat this, not that. Watch your carbs. Eat good fat, but not too much. Limit your salt. Avoid additives. Eat all-natural. In other words, don’t eat anything that tastes good. We know now more than ever that our diet affects our health, probably more than we wish it did. No amount of exercise and vitamin intake can overcome…