Deeply immersed in a constant bubble bath of sin, you cannot communicate with Jesus Christ unless you are ready to get out of the bath. John 1:9
The picture of love and truth together is in Jesus. The challenge is to resist the temptation to think in terms of a mixture or recipe: 50% love and 50% truth. The historic creeds affirm Jesus as fully God AND fully human, and likewise with love and ...
Give other Christians permission to be different from you. You're not the only Christ-follower in the world, and neither are you the most committed. Your way of loving Jesus is neither the only way for the best. If you don't know that, your Christian...
The authors of the gospels, like all writers in all time periods, either reference information they have at hand – including things they’ve heard or read – or they make things up. . . For reference material, the author of Mark relied not on Jes...
Understanding points Jesus presented to his peers requires exploring how Jews, local Greeks, Romans and other ethnic mixes inhabiting the region perceived reality. Without a clear recognition of the common ancient mindset, regard for precepts present...
When I was trying to earn Jesus by being good, I missed the real Jesus who wants us to love him and serve him not for what he gives but for who he is—dangerous, unpredictable, radical, and amazing.
Jesus is not your accuser. He’s not your prosecutor. He’s not your judge. He’s your friend and your rescuer. Like Zacchaeus, just spend time with Jesus. Don’t hide from him in shame or reject him in self-righteousness. Don’t allow the opini...
When Jesus put on flesh, He made human existence “sacred.” Thus, when you are inhabited by Jesus through His Holy Spirit, your life takes on the “sacred” characteristic as well. This does not mean that you become God or incapable of sinning l...
Excuses will become self-refuting. No man who does not believe that Jesus is the perfect, sinless Son of God can, in his desperation and love for sin, reasonably use and misconstrue Jesus' words that unless a Christian is perfect, then that Christian...
If contemporary Christians took seriously the possibility that those outside the boundaries of the church might hold the promise of renewal, if we ceased regarding ourselves as the source of salvation and the secular world as a potential threat, and ...
Indeed, a quick glance around this broken world makes it painfully obvious that we don't need more arguments on behalf of God; we need more people who live as if they are in covenant with Unconditional Love, which is our best definition of God. (p. 2...
Jesus-shaped spirituality hears Jesus say "believe and repent," but the call that resonates most closely in the heart of a disciple is "follow me." The command to follow requires that we take a daily journey in the company of other students. It deman...
The miracles of Jesus are nevertheless more than individual blessings. They are also symbols and types that reveal the full scope of Jesus' identity as the mighty Jehovah, the Creator, the one who provides for his people, and above all the Christ, wh...
This is the picture of a woman cast in the role of a learner, a pupil, even a rabbinic student. Quite obviously this is a prohibited role for women in those days and in that culture. Yet Jesus affirms Mary in that role. Martha, however, rebukes her. ...
Listen, O lord of the meeting rivers, things standing shall fall, but the moving ever shall stay.
Eomer: Now is the hour! Riders of Rohan! Oaths you have taken, now fulfill them all, to lord and land!
Tracy Lord: [normal voice] Hello, Dexter. [lower voice] Tracy Lord: Hello, George. [high childish voice] Tracy Lord: Hello, Mike.
I knew that to really minister to Rwanda's needs meant working toward reconciliation in the prisons, in the churches, and in the cities and villages throughout the country. It meant feeding the hungry, sheltering the homeless, caring for the young, b...
Lieutenant Daniel Taylor: That's what all these cripples down at the VA talk about: Jesus this and Jesus that, have I found Jesus yet? They even had a priest come and talk to me. He said God is listening and if I found Jesus, I'd get to walk beside h...
Gamling: Every villager able to wield a sword has been sent to the armory... my lord? Theoden: Who am I, Gamling? Gamling: You are our king, sire. Theoden: And do you trust your king? Gamling: Your men, my Lord, will follow you to whatever end. Theod...
Macaulay Connor: This is the Bridal Suite. Would you send up a couple of caviar sandwiches and a bottle of beer? Margaret Lord: What? Who is this? Macaulay Connor: This is the Voice of Doom calling. Your days are numbered, to the seventh son of the s...
