overcoming on Holy Week

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 ...

Mark did not know exactly what we would be scared of all these years later; he just knew we would be. By ending his gospel right there, right in the middle of a sentence, he also left us free to decid...

Generous One You entrust us with the goodness Of your faith and field Yet We grasp We scheme Deliver us from wickedness We reject We harm Deliver us from wickedness We murder We seize what ...

Preaching Commentary Sailing at a Snail's Pace 0.33 miles per hour. That’s about how fast the disciples were going as they tried to haul their boat across the water with the wind against them. ...

Leader: Creator God, our Source and our Home, we belong to you. All: We praise you, and we gather to worship you and give our lives to you. Living Christ, you establish justice, overthrow the ...

Eternal God and King over all creation, who granted us life at this hour, forgive us the sins that we have committed today in thought, word and deed, and cleanse, O Lord, our humble souls from a...

Pastor: God not only provides us with armor to stand against the devil’s schemes, but once fitted for battle, He tells us to pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests ...

To live well is to work well.

Jesus cared that they were scared It was their fear that drew Him near He heard their cry He saw  that they were terrified So He came close He walked beside He got in He didn’t pass by And He sai...

Heavenly Father, we have forgotten your generosity and kindness. Believing you hold back from us, we have held back from others and from you. Gracious God, hear our confessions , and make us mindfu...

Sailing at a Snail's Pace 0.33 miles per hour. That’s about how fast the disciples were going as they tried to haul their boat across the water with the wind against them. The disciples had proba...

Leader: May the Lord, who is your stronghold, help you in times of trouble. You who know the triune God—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—as your God, trust in the Lord. He will not let those who seek Hi...

Sometimes evil can feel so strong, so powerful, that its damage seems permanent and the final word on the subject. In this short excerpt from Philip Yancey, we see a reversal, perhaps a foretaste of w...

The waters are rising, but so am I. I am not going under, but over.

It’s easy to label what we consider “good things” in our lives as gifts from God and to welcome them with gratitude. But when difficult things happen, we don’t look at them as part of God’s good plan ...

There are few words in any language that can equal dikaiosis for theological depth and resonance. It has been at the center of scholarly debate for centuries. Known largely as “justification,” it is s...

Jesus, you sow yourself The Word of Truth, generously The Word of Life, graciously Defend us from the Evil One Who seeks to snatch us away Fortify us for hard times and costly discipleship That we m...

Christ did not die to forgive sinners who go on treasuring anything above seeing and savoring God. And people who would be happy in heaven if Christ were not there, will not be there. The gospel is no...

Fear Not! In the first Advent God keeps saying, “Fear not!” It’s a word we need to hear today too. Zechariah and Elizabeth were told that after decades of waiting they’d finally have a child in thei...

Epiphanies in Scripture are met with reactions of disbelief (Gideon), awe (the Magi), amazement (Cana), or—most often—“fear and trembling.” It is precisely for this reason that the biblical angels are...

Merciful God, you have moved and changed our lives in amazing ways, yet we have kept these stories to ourselves. We confess the times we have kept these stories to ourselves out of fear of rejection a...

The Gospels list some 125 Christ-issued imperatives. Of these, 21 urge us to “not be afraid” or “not fear” or “have courage” or “take heart” or “be of good cheer.” The second most common command, to l...

Leader: God is my light and my salvation; of whom should I be afraid? All: Though violence rise all around me I will not be drawn into fear. One thing I asked of God, that will I seek af...

In the words of E. Stanley Jones, “The God I find in Christ is a God who overcomes evil with good, hate by love, and the world by a cross.

All the world is full of suffering. It is also full of overcoming.

A little boy is afraid of the dark. One night his mother tells him to go out to the back porch and bring her the broom. The little boy turns to his mother and says, “Mama, I don’t want to go out there...

Sometimes we have to “step over” our anger, our jealousy, or our feelings of rejection and move on. The temptation is to get stuck in our negative emotions, poking around in them as if we belong there...

Recently I read about an experiment done by psychologist Jonathan Haidt. He came up with a fascinating hypothetical exercise, which went something like this: Participants were handed a summary of a p...

R.W. DeHann wrote of a missionary who, shortly after arriving on the field, was speaking for the first time to a group of villagers. He was trying to present the gospel to them. He began by describing...

Peacemaking doesn’t mean passivity. It is the act of interrupting injustice without mirroring injustice, the act of disarming evil without destroying the evildoer, the act of finding a third way that ...