“Edwards challenges the idea that we can be true Christians apart from a growing life of private prayer. If we lack that, we may as well face up to the fact that we are hypocrites.” Today, a dear friend and prayer warrior pointed me to T. M. Moore’s, Give Him No Rest: Readings, Meditations, and … More When Private Prayer Condemns Us
Over the years, consulting with many churches, pastoring three, planting one, overseeing the planting of seven others, I have come to the conclusion that many in our churches have a misunderstanding of and a conflation of terms when they talk about outreach and evangelism. They are different. They may be handmaids to one another but … More The Difference between Outreach and Evangelism
Updating a Reading List for Multi-ethnic Ministry The bibliography associated with my chapter in A Heart for Community: New Models for Urban and Suburban Ministry (2010) is somewhat out of date. This is not because the previous books are irrelevant or have been superseded but because new literature has been added to the corpus of … More An Updated Reading List on Multi-ethnic Ministry and a Short Apologetic for Broader Reading Patterns
I started this post some time ago (2 years). I hope it is completely irrelevant. Gun violence isn’t a left or right issue. It isn’t even a law versus more laws issue. There is more evidence all the time of a deep sickness at the core of American society in these shootings in Columbine, CO, … More The Next Shooting
I had lunch with an old friend from college today who was holding on to a broken-hearted joy. For many years, two of his children have been wandering in far countries, like prodigals aiming at pig styes. Two children who had left the fold and with it, despite all of my friend and his wife’s … More Holding on to Broken-hearted Joy
The revelation of the character of our God is all over the Bible. Psalm 15 was part of today’s meditation. Inferences from Psalm 15 concerning the character of God: That he is holy. That he is blameless. That he is truth speaker. That he does no evil. That he despises vile things. That he honors … More He is Worthy
Christmas is near. I love it when I find or someone sends me new artists or songs of praise that have substance to their thinking. I’m so tired of “Christian songs” that are more about the singer than they are about Jesus and the Kingdom. Songs with good theology that exalt the Living God, the … More O Come, All You UNfaithful
“‘I hate war as only a soldier who has lived it can, only as one who has seen its brutality, its futility, its stupidity.’ Ike declared in 1946. Ike had seen the horrors of war in the Nazi concentration camps, the Normandy landing and assault, and the bloody battles in North Africa. He had written … More We Could Use Such a Leader Today
A Liturgy for a Day Filled with Christ A Call to Worship as We Greet the Day “Let those who delight in righteousness because they know they are unrighteous and yet have been made righteous by the grace of God shout for joy and be glad. May we be a people who say with all … More A Day’s Liturgy for a Covid19 World
Inviting God into the Night An Evening Benediction to Sanctify the Night Volume 1, Day 9 Sleep well brother. Sleep well sister. Your God watches over you.
