living on Submission

We sometimes imagine surrender to God as emotional starvation. Every pleasure feels suspicious, and every passion feels in competition with our love of God. We think that the more miserable we are in ...

Therefore I urge you, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service. Don’t be conformed to this world, bu...

To accept this [Jesus' self-humiliation in washing the disciples' feet] is to be converted. And nothing can be added to this. If you imagine that you can add something to what is given in the ...

On a beautiful April afternoon in 2008, two college softball teams faced off in a decisive playoff game beneath the Cascade Mountains. The Western Oregon Wolves battled Central Washington University, ...

Humble Father, we admit to you tonight that our selfishness runs deeper than we know. Even in our service to others, we often expect a reward or result. We really only want to serve others when we see...

Merciful Jesus Grant us courage to deny privilege to lay down favor and safety and take up the cross of opportunity and justice Merciful Jesus Grant us courage to deny consumerism to lay down conve...

...left to ourselves we lapse into a kind of collusion with entrophy, acquiescing in the general belief that things may be getting worse but that there's nothing much we can do about them. And we ...

Risen Christ, The world despised and rejected you You responded with grace, humility, and welcome The proud questioned your power, devised your death You responded with peace, forgiveness, and new lif...

Our mission is the mission of Jesus Christ.  He lived as an ordinary human being. We will care for the common life of humanity. He served men and women. We are committed to working for human wel...

Pastor: Go now in confidence and joy, offering yourselves as living sacrifices of worship and praise.  People: Direct our days and our deeds as we live out our calling to look, live, and lo...

Humble and self-forgetting we must be always, but diffident and apologetic about the gospel never.

Mary was a nobody who became greater than everybody, simply because God came to her and she responded in the humblest possible way. She reasoned, she doubted, she surrendered, she connected with other...

A truly remarkable example of sacrificial courage took place in Folsom, New Mexico, in 1908. When a flood was racing toward the valley, a resident from the hills warned a local woman, S. J. Brooks, th...

Gracious God, our decisions are often rooted in keeping comfortable. We keep quiet in order to protect ourselves. We give just enough to look good in front of others. We hold back to avoid pain. Yet y...

We thank you, God our Father, that by your grace, mercy and love, expressed today in Word and Sacrament, You give us Your Son, the true bread from heaven and the fountain of living water. Strengthen u...

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...

In view of all that God has accomplished for his people in Christ, how should his people live? They should present themselves to God as a ‘living sacrifice’, consecrated to him. The animal sacrifices ...

Pastor: Brothers and sisters in Christ, as we gather on this Thursday of Holy Week, let us humbly draw near to the Lord to remember what He has done and to receive what He gives to us by His Word an...

Pastor: O God, You desire not the death of sinners, but rather that we turn from our evil way and live. We come before You, although we have sinned and deserve only Your wrath; yet we flee to Your m...

Jesus, we receive your blessings and pray for the Holy Spirit to make them real in our lives. Renew a right spirit within us, a poor spirit, a spirit that knows our deep need of your grace and deliver...

Pastor: Hear what the Apostle Paul says to God’s people in Romans 12: I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and a...

A dead thing can go with the stream, but only a living thing can go against it.

“My sister having so much to do, was going to church vicariously, that is to say, Joe and I were going.”

Frank Laubach recounts the profound shift in his life that came when he wholeheartedly committed to following God’s will: Before that moment, I was barely alive—like a tree rotting from within. Bu...

In the Second World War, a group of soldiers were fighting in the rural countryside of France. During an intense battle, one of the American soldiers was killed. His comrades did not want to leave his...

In the early fifth century, even as Rome had officially embraced Christianity, the brutal spectacle of gladiatorial combat continued in the Colosseum, drawing massive crowds. One day, a Christian herm...

Take up your cross and follow Jesus the Messiah, who suffered and died that we might share in his resurrection life and have no shame when he comes again in the glory of his Father. Amen.

Pride juggles with her toppling towers, They strike the sun and cease, But the firm feet of humility They grip the ground like trees.

Good Shepherd, You call me by name, so I can know you You prepare the way, so I can follow You call others, so we will have companions You lay down your life, so we may live Glory to You and your savi...

Context 1 Peter is traditionally attributed to the apostle Peter. It is addressed to Christian communities in diaspora, scattered across Asia Minor (modern-day Turkey), who were experiencing social m...