This sermon was preached on November 3-5th at Northland, A Church Distributed, in Longwood Florida. The link includes the whole worship service which I hope you will find uplifting. The sermon starts at the 39 minute mark. Being a Person of Hospitality We have lost something in our culture. It is the practice of valuing …
Tag: Christianity
Honoring Obama Even When You Disagree With Him: The Sequel
This piece was first posted four years ago today. I find that it is just as relevant now as it was then and can only hope that people who claim to follow Christ will exhibit Christ-like character no matter what their political position may be. It is deeply concerning to me that I see many …
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Jesus said to them, “my wife”
Yep, that's the line that has the theological nerd world all a buzz. Of course it probably also has caused no small amount of questioning and consternation among the faithful as well as gloating among the skeptics. It all stems from a scrap of 4th century paper about the size of a business card on …
Christianity’s Fate Is Not Contingent on America
Before you go off on me as being somehow un-American, I was born into a typical Pittsburgh blue-collar family. My Dad's first job was in a coal mine before he worked his way to owning a Chrysler-Plymouth dealership and fulfilling his version of the American dream. My favorite actor always has been and always will …
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The Pain Possibilities of Africa
I am coming to the end of a week in Burundi in Eastern Africa. I don't know how many times I have been to Africa in the last 6 years. It is probably approaching twenty. I do know that I have been to eleven different countries from Egypt to South Africa. Without fail I am …
“Not the Way It’s Supposed to Be” by Cornelius Plantinga
Make no mistake, this is a book about sin. It is about the hideous nature of sin, the way it corrupts, destroys, and slowly sucks the life out of people. It is not the kind of thing most people want to talk about these days. Sin has been replaced with "dysfunction", "addiction", "syndrome" and a …
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Week 6 from Genesis Study Now Available
This is week 6 from our study of Genesis covering 5:1-6:8. Among other things, we take a look at that strange verse about the Sons of God and the Daughters of Men and the Nephilim Genesis Study on Video Week Six I hope you enjoy it and will add your voice to the conversation.
Christianity and Science: Is There a Conflict?
As a kid I was enthralled with science, any branch of science, astronomy, biology, chemistry, paleontology, physics, anatomy, it didn't matter. Until the fifth grade I lived in a house that backed up to a huge woods that included a spring fed pond where my best friend Bobby Kramer and I used to catch salamanders, …
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Three Must Have Relationships in Your Life. (Pt 2 of 3)
His name was Joseph. Yet everyone called him Barnabas, which means "Son of Encouragement". That name became such a part of his identity that today few people remember that his given name was Joseph and we refer to him only as Barnabas. So how did Joseph become Barnabas for the rest of history? There are …
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Things God Hates
Recently a friend told me of a conversation he had about God. When the person found out that he followed Jesus she told him she had a list of questions for God. One of them was, "why does God hate Halloween?" My first thought was "wow, I didn't see that coming". My next thought was, …
The World Ends on May 21st Part 2
Just thought I would add this link from CNN's religion blog. It gives great background into the folks traveling the country proclaiming that their leader has figured out that the world will end on Saturday. Admittedly you have to admire their willingness to forsake everything to get out the message that they think is true, …
Easter: The Most Important Day in History
Historians love to speculate on the what ifs of major historical events. What if Oswald had missed in November of 1963 in Dealy Plaza? What if Von Stauffenberg had armed both bombs and placed them on the other side of the table leg in Hitler's Wolf's Lair? What if Richard the Lionheart had lived to …
Blessed are the Peacemakers
Matt 5:9 “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God. In a time of revolution and upheaval, and following possibly the most violent century on record, it seems almost laughable that there could possibly any real hope of bringing peace into the world. Yet Jesus seems to think that there are …
President Obama: Christian or Muslim?
One thing you have to love about people, is the way we can refuse to let the facts get in the way of a good preconceived notion, conspiracy theory, or deeply held conviction. Depending on which poll you read in the past several months, anywhere from 18 to 24% of Americans still think that the …
Alabama Governor Says, “You’re Not My Brother”
Alabama Governor, Robert Bentley has people in an outrage over comments he recently made at a church where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was once pastor. Politics Daily is reporting that Bentley was making the point that as Governor he is color blind and serves all the people of the state equally. But he went …
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The Provocative Christian 