How To Listen To A Sermon: So the call is to listen eagerly and expectantly to the preaching and teaching of God’s Word, looking for instruction and edification at every opportunity.  But our eagerness must be joined with careful reflection.  Both phases are needed for spiritual maturity and growth in Christlikeness.

How To See Our Differences As Opportunities: But Jesus himself told us to pray for our enemies. Can you do so? Can you understand that different approaches may be needed in different scenarios, like a counselor exercising discernment and care? Even better, can you admit that we need all the compassionate, courageous, and commissioned Christians we can muster to work together out of respect for God’s gifting and in obedience to Jesus? The magnitude of our challenges today ought to dispel the illusion that any one wing of the divided church can go it alone.

The Baltimore Thug Debate: Why It's Not Solving Any Problems: Jesus’ teachings provide answers to the spiritual problems facing African-Americans in Baltimore, as well as some helpful solutions to some of the other challenges currently affecting both black and other racial communities in the city (i.e. blessed are the peacemakers)

How To Shut Down Gossip: Gossip is nasty. It is never good and should be despised by all who love Christ and his church. Instead of being passive and tolerating something that is widespread we should be vigilant to remove something that is destructive and vile. Let’s step our game up and, starting with ourselves, work to shut down gossip.

The Unchanging Truth About Jesus And The Danger Of Following Fads: What was once true about Jesus will always be true about Jesus. You don’t need some clever recreation or refashioning of biblical truth about Jesus. He and the truth about him is the same yesterday, today, and forever!

Calling People To The Kingdom Through Feasts: I grew up believing that after I died, I would go to heaven, which would be like an eternal church service. As a teenager, I wasn’t too excited about that. All I could imagine was a bunch of us in white gowns floating on clouds that felt like hard wooden pews. We would forever listen to long sermons and sing songs from red hymnals. Later in life, as I read the Bible, I found out that this is not an accurate picture of our future with Jesus. The Scriptures tell of a day when we will dwell on a new earth and enjoy a sin-free existence, living life fully and abundantly with God in our midst. We will eat, play, create, work, celebrate, and rest in perfect harmony with God and one another. It will all be good and it will all be worship!

Feminism Isn't Good Enough: Diversity is a good thing. We need the qualities that both men and women carry; they are equal in value and equally necessary for understanding the whole of who God is. He has made men and women in his image, he has made us unique, and he has given us equally important and differing roles within his kingdom.

I Am Barabbas: As we more greatly understand the depths of our sin, we see with Luke, “I am Barabbas.” I am the one so clearly guilty and deserving of condemnation but set free because of the willing substitution of the Son of God in my place. “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick,” Jesus says in Mark 2:17. “I came not to call the righteous, but sinners.”

The Unrighteous Will Not Inherent The Kingdom Of God: Just think of it: through faith in Jesus Christ and repentance from sin God can release into your life the power of the Holy Spirit that can swallow up your disordered desires in something greater and more beautiful and more desirable so that you can live each day in a way pleasing to God, even in the midst of on-going struggles and brokenness.

Helping Children Benefit From The Sermon: There are many other things you could do, but this is just a list of items that we have found helpful in our family and church. Perhaps you have others; feel free to list them in the comments so that others may benefit from them.

The Spiritual Stages Of A Believer's Life: In turn, he will call them to live in light of these privileges. On the surface, it appears that John may simply have been seeking to address the children, young men and older men in the congregations to whom he is writing; but, a consideration of what he says–namely, that all the saving benefits belong to all believers who are united to Christ–leads to a very different conclusion.

A Theology Of Sports: Nevertheless, we can’t let the reality of sin warp our view of sports. We need to be careful, for sure, always using discernment, always aware of our tendency to drift away from the gospel and to make things other than God ultimate in our lives. But we can’t forget that, in the end, sin doesn’t win. One day, we will live in a kingdom void of sin and corruption—everything that robs sports of all they might be. And it is our role now to usher in and live in this kingdom, making it on earth as it is in heaven—and that includes the way in which we see and interact with sports.

The Follow Of The Cross And The Wisdom Of God: An April Fool's Meditation: It is fitting that April Fool’s Day should fall in the middle of Holy Week this year. Though it’s not noted in the Church Calendars alongside Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, or Easter Sunday, yet the gospel of Christ’s passion has always been caught up with the reality of folly has it not?

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