BANG! The hammer hit the rock. No change. BANG! The hammer hit the rock again. No change. BANG! BANG! BANG! On and on it seemed for hours the hammer tried to break the rock open. Over and over again it struck the rock with no apparent change. Then suddenly: BANG!Continue Reading
(adapted from a GiveHim15 post from August 16, 2022) “Have you considered ‘prayer walking’ through your neighborhood? “For years my friend Mary took to heart Jesus’ command to ‘love your neighbor as yourself’ (see Mark 12:31) by continually praying over her neighborhood when she walked. In fact, she did thisContinue Reading
“Good and evil both increase at compound interest. That is why the little decisions you and I make every day are of such infinite importance. The smallest good act today is the capture of a strategic point from which, a few months later, you may be able to go onContinue Reading
On Sundays our pastor has been preaching a series on getting the junk out of our lives. Although so far he’s preached on things like self will, anger, bitterness, and pride, the last two sermons have been about lust. Generally, we think of lust as being wanting someone else inContinue Reading
Do you ever wish you could get a direct word from God? We can read his Word, pray, and still feel like “I got nothing.” But every so often we realize that he has been talking with us. Recently I’ve been “stuck” in Hebrews 12. Over and over I readContinue Reading
In his sermon series on getting rid of things within us that are not of God, our pastor has been preaching about lust. Sexual desire for another person is one type of lust, but any strong desire for money, power, things, etc. can be another type of lust. This remindedContinue Reading
Delight – to please someone greatly, to take great pleasure in something “Set your mind and keep focused habitually on the things above [the heavenly things], not on things that are on the earth [which have only temporal value].” (Colossians 3:2 AMP) What is your mind set on? I, personally, am challenged to considerContinue Reading
(adapted from GiveHim15 post 8/8/22) “My daughter, Rachel Shafer, shares an important truth in her book, Expect God. She writes: “‘Several years ago, our youngest daughter Lily had major surgery. It was almost 12 hours long, extremely complicated, and included a long recovery time. We were a couple of weeksContinue Reading
This year our pastor has been preaching through a variety of spiritual disciplines and he’s currently talking about meditation. Meditation is just focusing intently upon something. In our spiritual lives, healthy meditation is about focusing deeply and intentionally – to “sink your teeth in” – and to ponder the WordContinue Reading
In addition to listening to Michael Card teach this week, I’ve started rereading a Philip Yancey book The Jesus I Never Knew. Between these two teachers I’m being immersed in a good measure of Jesus’s humanity. Theologians have decided (and most of the Church agrees) that Jesus was “both fullyContinue Reading