I’ll tip my hand to one assumption I am making. I assume that an intimate, conversational walk with God is available, and is meant to be normal. I’ll push that a step further. I assume that if you don’t find that kind of relationship...
READ MORE
I’ll tip my hand to one assumption I am making. I assume that an intimate, conversational walk with God is available, and is meant to be normal. I’ll push that a step further. I assume that if you don’t find that kind of relationship...
READ MOREYou were the model of perfection,
full of wisdom and perfect in beauty.
You were in Eden,
the garden of God;
every precious stone adorned you:
ruby, topaz and emerald,
chrysolite, onyx and jasper,
...
We must come to face our style of relating, of course. As men, we look to where we are passive, and where we are domineering or harsh or violent. As women, we face where we are controlling, and where we are desperately clingy. And as God reveals...
READ MOREIf you'll recall, Moses put a veil over his face, first to hide his glory, then to hide the fact that it was fading away. That, too, was a picture of a deeper reality. We all do that. We all have veiled our glory, or someone has veiled it for us...
READ MOREPlayful, cunning, generous, fierce—not one moment of it is contrived. Jesus never plays to the audience, never kowtows to the opposition, never takes his cues from the circus around him. He is simply being himself.
The diversity of Jesus’...
READ MORELife has a way of wearing on a person. Under the weight of losses, pressures, failures, and endless demands, something in our souls begins to wither. Passions dry up. The zeal of a beginning turns into a despairing end. A stone falls heavily down...
READ MOREThe most dangerous man on earth is the man who has reckoned with his own death. All men die; few men ever really live. Sure, you can create a safe life for yourself ... and end your days in a rest home babbling on...
He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds. (Ps. 147:3)
Yes, we have all been wounded in this battle. And we will be wounded again. But something deeper has also happened to us than mere wounds.
I expect that all of us at...
READ MOREThe Ephesians passage warns about spiritual strongholds created in our lives when we let “the sun go down” on something. Note that in this case that something isn’t necessarily sin. Paul says, “in your anger do not sin,” so anger does not equal...
READ MOREGod sets his own image on the earth. He creates a being like himself. He creates a son. The LORD God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being. (Gen. 2:7)
... READ MOREWe need Jesus like we need oxygen. Like we need water. Like the branch needs the vine. Jesus is not merely a figure for devotions. He is the missing essence of your existence. Whether we know it or not, we are desperate for Jesus.
To...
READ MOREWe long for beauty, and when the biblical writers speak of heaven, they use the most beautiful imagery they can. You can almost hear the agony of the writer trying to get it right while knowing he falls far short of what he sees. In the book of...
READ MOREJesus said we must take up our cross and die to the supremacy of Self every single day, probably many times a day (see Matthew 10:38; 16:24; Mark 8:34; Luke 9:23; 14:27).
We must crucify the exalted, offended Self, that’s clear. But what...
READ MORE“In all their distress he too was distressed” (Isa. 63:9). We can know that in our distress God too is distressed. Jesus understands heartbreak, betrayal, abandonment, loneliness, sorrow, and pain. He is acquainted with grief. He cares. He cares...
READ MOREWhen Jesus had called the Twelve together, he gave them power and authority to drive out all demons and to cure diseases, and he sent them out to preach the kingdom of God and to heal the sick…So they set out and went from village to village,...
READ MORE