place on Power of Sin

An Irish church once had a humorous yet insightful motto that gets at the heart of the pain that often accompanies our relationships: “To dwell above with those we love will certainly be glory. But to...

Preaching Commentary In Israel’s tribal society, redemption was the act of a patriarch who put his own resources on the line to ransom a family member who had been driven to the margins of society b...

Pastor: Blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man against whom the LORD counts no iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no deceit. All: For when I...

Lord–in the words of the Psalmist,“You have been our dwelling place throughout all generations,” our safe place to run to, and the One who opens the door when we knock–no matter what. Because of Your ...

The fact is there is nothing that we are doing that God could not raise up a stone in the field to do for him. The realization of this puts us in our true place. Though, lest we get too knocked down by...

All: O Lord, you declare that the forgiven person is blessed, that the person who has no deceit is blessed. We confess that we have had deceitful hearts, deceitful tongues, deceitful thoughts, and dec...

Leader: Lord, you have been our dwelling place in all generations. All: Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever you had formed the earth and the world, from everlasting to everlasting you a...

[God’s grace is] always hidden under the strangest appearances.

Why must holy places be dark places?

Leader: God’s word is a lamp to our feet and a light to our path. People: God is our hiding place and our shield; let us hope in his word. Leader: Let our cry come before the Lord, that he might g...

We think that Paradise and Calvary, Christ’s Cross and Adam’s Tree, stood in one place; Look Lord and find both Adams met in me; As the first Adam’s sweat surrounds my face, May the last Adam’s blood ...

Leader: How lovely is your dwelling place, O Lord of hosts! People: My soul longs, yes, faints for the courts of the Lord; my heart and flesh sing for joy to the living God. Leader: Blessed are ...

Leader: Look! God’s dwelling is here with humankind. God dwells with us, and we are God’s people. People: God will wipe away every tear from our eyes. Death will be no more. There will be no more mo...

Our Scriptures that bring us the story of our salvation ground us in place. Everywhere they insist on this grounding. Everything that is critically important to us takes place on the ground. Mountains...

God is our safe space, our hiding place, a very present help in times of trouble. God is our safety, we will not fear! The mountains shake, the oceans roar, the nations rage, the world changes. ...

In Israel’s tribal society, redemption was the act of a patriarch who put his own resources on the line to ransom a family member who had been driven to the margins of society by poverty, who had been...

Yahweh, unlike the mountain and fertility gods of the ancient Canaanites, refuses to be bound by any geographical locale. All of the 'high places' pretending to capture the divine presence mus...

Pastor: How lovely is your dwelling place, O LORD of hosts! All: For a day in your courts is better than a thousand elsewhere. I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the...

Where transformation is actually carried out is in our real life, where we dwell with God and our neighbors. . . . First, we must accept the circumstances we constantly find ourselves in as the place ...

There is no mere world or matters of fact for covenant theology; there is always the wonder and duty to the concrete moment at hand, where God’s illimitable gift of life is given into our hands – to h...

So then you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and of the household of God, Being built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus ...

Leader: "Lord, you have been our dwelling place for all generations. From everlasting to everlasting, You are God." People: But in comparison, the days of our life on this earth are but a ...

N.T. Wright takes some time in his book, How God Became King , to connect the idea of the logos (the eternal Word), with the idea of “dwelling,” or abiding in God’s presence: The Word became flesh ...

Come Thou and dwell with me,  Lord of the holy race;  Make here Thy resting-place, Hear me, O Trinity.  That I Thy love may prove,  Teach Thou my heart and hand,  Ever at Thy command Swiftly to move...

I love that line. “Surely the LORD is in this place,” Jacob muses, “and I was not aware of it.” Isn’t that, more or less, the story with most of us, most of the time?

As in buying real estate, three principles are crucial to understanding a person’s words: location, location, and location. We cannot make sense of what someone says unless we understand the context i...

The Latin words humus, soil/earth, and homo, human being, have a common derivation, from which we also get our word 'humble.' This is the Genesis origin of who we are: dust - dust that the Lor...

In The Hiding Place Corrie ten Boom tells of the time she and her father needed to find a safer place for a Jewish mother and child they had been concealing from the Nazis. A local clergyman cam...

Leader: Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. All: And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of he...

Not everyone living in a distressed neighborhood is associated with gang members, parole officers, employers, social workers, or pastors. But nearly all of them have a landlord. —Matthew Desmond, E...