The temptation to sculpt God according to our expectations and presuppositions, to make this God much like another, is strong with us. You see it all down through history: in the Middle Ages it seemed...
Genesis 18:22-33, Exodus 3:1-12 , 1 Kings 19:9-13, John 5:19-30, John 16:12-15, Psalm 116:1-2
The God who shares power is a listener. Listening is not something that becomes necessary for God only after the world is created. Listening is who God is. In God’s very being, communication does not ...
Pastor: Almighty and eternal God, we adore You as the God and Father of our Lord and Savior Jesus, and with the whole Church on earth and all the hosts of heaven we ascribe to You honor and blessing...
I can lose my job; I might be released from a position. My career can come to an end when I retire from the organization I work in. But my vocation comes from God; it remains and is not in the end som...
Aseity refers to God’s self-existence (a—from, se—oneself). God exists ‘from himself.’ God owes his existence and completeness as God to nothing outside himself. . . . God’s act of creation was not c...
We confess, “I believe in God.” That confession is not an expression of a creative imagination or an instance of projection, but a response to the One who manifests himself in creation, in history, in...
God of mercy, deliver us from our fear in which we judge others. We pray for all who are oppressed, imprisoned, persecuted or rejected. To you who have delivered us from slavery we pray for the faith ...
God uses our identity crises to reveal who we are and who he is. Sometimes these crises come out of nowhere. Something devastating happens. Someone close to us dies. We are diagnosed, or someone we kn...
Context Prophecy: Not Just Future-Telling When confronted with the question of the purpose of the prophetic books in the Old Testament, it is commonly supposed that their primary purpose is future t...
Context Prophecy: Not Just Future-Telling When confronted with the question of the purpose of the prophetic books in the Old Testament, it is commonly supposed that their primary purpose is future t...
Genesis 12:1-4 , Exodus 3:1-12, Micah 6:8, Matthew 4:18-22 , Ephesians 2:10, Psalm 90:12 , Matthew 9:9
It is helpful to understand the call of God in three distinct ways. First, there is the call to be a Christian. The God of creation invites us to respond to his love. This call comes through Jesus, wh...
A number of mature Christians have described the Christian journey as one in which the follower of Jesus experiences different levels of grace. Let us imagine . . . that there are many rooms in t...
God calls people. Whether it is the calling of Abraham to leave the land of Ur and go he knew not where, or the calling of Moses, confronted with the burning bush, or the calling of Isaiah who encount...
Pastor: Be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might, with feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. Go out into the world with joy and hope, standing firm in...
He also needed to take off his sandals, because God was too holy for his shoes. To this day in the Middle East, removing one’s sandals is a sign of respect.
Isaiah 65:17-25, Micah 4:1-4, Exodus 3:7-10 , Luke 4:18-19, Matthew 5:1-12, Psalm 146:7-9
Author and Episcopal priest Stephanie Spellers suggests that instead of imagining a kingdom, a better way for us to understand what Jesus had in mind when he spoke of this script, this new way of livi...
We cannot be true Christians without being original. Nothing gives us personality like prayer. Nothing makes man so original. To be creative, we must live with the Creator. Prayer places man in direct...
Pastor: Peter calls on believers in exile to rid themselves of those things that would point themselves and others away from Christ. Like the early church, we too are to rid ourselves of all mali...
Exodus 3:10-12, 1 Samuel 3:8-10, Matthew 4:18-20, Acts 9:3-6, 2 Timothy 1:9, Psalm 139:13-16
Older notions of vocation and vocational development assumed that people wrestled with matters of vocation as a young adult. It has been commonly assumed that vocational counseling was provided in hig...
What Moses saw in the burning bush was nothing less than “the transcendent essence and cause of the universe, on which everything depends, alone subsists.
If you’ve been around a kid who’s just learned to ask “why?”, it can be a bit much. You’ll be asked, “why is grass green?” “Why do birds fly?” “Why do I get hungry?” and much, much, more. Pa...
My brother, who attended a Bible College during a smart-alecky phase in his life, enjoyed shocking groups of believers by sharing his “life verse.” After listening to others quote pious phrases from P...
Genesis 21:14–19, Luke 15:1–7 , John 10:1–16, Psalm 139:7–12, Exodus 3:1–12 , 1 Kings 19:1–13, Psalm 91:14-15, 2 Peter 2:9, John 10:27, Romans 10:17, John 5:37, John 8:47
On May 1, 2023, a small aircraft carrying seven passengers crashed deep in the Amazon rainforest, one of the most remote regions on Earth. The Cessna had been flying between two villages in southern C...
Exodus 3:10-12, Joshua 1:9, Matthew 6:33, Romans 8:28, Psalm 121:1-2
Pastor: Lord God, we thank You that You have taught us what You would have us believe and do. Help us by Your Holy Spirit, for the sake of Jesus Christ, to hold fast Your Word in our hearts. You ha...
Gracious God, we desire to follow when your call. We long to live according to the ways of Jesus, yet we find ourselves stumbling. Forgive us for the times we have failed to follow your example of com...