This morning I was reflecting on the NT view of worship and how radically different it is from conceptions of worship in the OT. Jesus truly made a seismic shift in the worship patterns of the Church. In the OT worship was about a place (the Temple), and the materials (incense, birds, lambs, bulls etc.), … More Worship is What We Were Made For
“Purity of heart is the will to one thing!” Soren Kierkegaard “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” (Romans 8:1) What joy the apostle Paul must have felt as he wrote these words! He had murdered multiple times in multiple cities but the gospel declared that even murders and … More Reading of Old Joy
Who Am I? Dietrich Bonhoeffer struggled with the battle we all fight. Are we who we think we are? Are we what others think we are (for good or ill)? Or are we something else that neither ourselves or others really know? Bonhoeffer put it this way in a poem from prison: Who am I? … More Probing Self-doubt and Trusting in the Grace of God
Wednesday is for Prayer From the archives of December 2008 and my old blog Why is it that silence is a better medium for the voice of God than the cacophony of sound we typically immerse ourselves in? We are addicted to noise and yet it is the addiction that most often drowns out the … More Listening to God. Trying to at Least.
My friend and mentor Bill Reed, wrote this week about the disciplines of Simplicity, Silence, Serenity, and Surrender espoused by Charles Swindoll in his book Intimacy with the Almighty. Bill passed on this quote from pages 51-53: Harassed by life, exhausted, we look about us for somewhere to be quiet, to be genuine, a place of refreshment. … More You Hold in Your Hands the Word of the Living God
Thursday is for Discipleship I’ve got limited time this week due to a DMin class, a message to prepare and the neighborhood crisis I mentioned yesterday. So here’s a short post reflecting on the Scripture. May we all sing the song of Moses and the Lamb. Thinking about Revelation 15:3-4 I want to sing with … More The Song of Moses and the Lamb
Friday is for Heart Songs . . . . . A man reading a newspaper saw a photo of birds chillin’ on electric wires laid out like sheet-music. He tried playing the birds as if they were notes. This is what it sounds like. The delight to me is that only God knew until a … More The Music of the Heart of God?
The title of today’s post is a paraphrase of what one non-Christian said to the church of the Netherlands some 200 years ago. I think the modern culture is saying something similar to us today. They are looking for some evidence that we are not “mere men.” They are looking for some evidence of a … More “You Christians Will Have to Sing Much Louder Before I Believe Your Religion”
I’ve been away participating in a retreat up in Wisconsin for the weekend. It was a great time to get away and devote the moments to seeking intimacy with God. Made some new friends, but now I’m exhausted from having not slept very well for three days. Maybe I’ll post some weekend readings later. My … More Live a Christ Focused Life
[From the Archives of my old blog, August 19, 2008. This was originally written about a friend two years ago but it has particular relevance for an old friend in a new situation. I first reposted this when Glen Kehrein of Circle Urban in Chicago lost his adult son (Nathan). Glen himself has now gone … More Devastating Loss of a Child and Grace for Eternity and Now
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