Life Goes On

Recently as I was reading about people from countries where Christians are persecuted, I came across a particular story regarding house churches in Russia. It seems that 3 House Church pastors had started multiple House Churches, but none of the groups knew about the others. This is a security thing. Wanting to somehow let them know that they were not alone, the 3 pastors got government permission to hold a week long Youth Convention. All told 700 students showed up. None of them had Bibles yet all of them were in House Churches. During the week they were given the assignment of getting with their particular group and writing down all they could remember of the 4 gospels, and to write the lyrics to all the Christian songs they knew. At the end of the week when the results were compiled, they had all 4 gospels written with less than a dozen mistakes and they had lyrics to 1200 songs. Phenomenal! However, some years later, after restrictions had been lifted and almost everyone h...

I took the title of this blog post from Revivalmatters.com in the information they put out about a "National Week of Repentance" scheduled for Oct. 30-Nov. 6.  You can find out more by going to their website at the link above. I want to "springboard" from their title to talk about our personal and corporate need for repentance.  As I mentioned in a recent sermon, when Achan violated God's command about taking "loot" from the destruction of Jericho, God did not say, "Achan sinned." Rather He said "Israel sinned."  Just because we individually may have never had an abortion, God holds us as a nation responsible for the death of millions of unborn children.  Israel bore the consequences of Achan's sin.  Not only did Achan and his family pay the ultimate price of death, but 3,000 Israeli soldiers died unnecessarily because of his sin.  In the same way we, as a nation, will bear the consequences of the murder of millions of childre...

I think that first I must identify myself.  I'm a pastor who has 2 church music degrees and spent the better part of 20 years as a Minister of Music and Youth.  As pastor of a fairly "traditional" church (we have a choir and sing hymns from hymnals) I often get "suggestions" from people that they would like to see more "praise and worship" (meaning choruses or JOY-FM music)  Let me hasten to say that I like it all from classical to contemporary (which varies depending on where you live) to hip-hop to rap.  I decided to look in the Bible to find what I could about worship. Interestingly enough, I found very little about music, except in the Psalms and in Revelation.  The defining words about the "new" church in Acts 2 are fellowship, praising God (which incorporates more than music) and meeting needs. To steal a phrase from Rick Warren, "It's not about you!"  We are to worship God...not a genre of music or a style of preaching. ...

My wife and I have just returned from the trip of a lifetime courtesy of our firstborn and her husband.  In 10 days we were in 5 states and 5 National Parks.  We flew from Orlando, FL to Denver, CO and met up with Kendra and family.  After a short night in Denver, we boarded the California Zephyr, early in the morning and headed for GrandJunction, CO.  The train ride was super with reclining seats, great views of the countryside and dinner in the dining car.  In Grand Junction my son in law rented a van and we spent a couple of days touring Colorado National Monument and Canyonland.  How anyone could view the magnificent scenery and still doubt there is a God is beyond me. Boarding the Zephyr again (this time in the evening) we traveled to Salt Lake City, UT, arriving about 1 a.m.  After sleeping a in a bit, we once again rented a van and headed out to view The Arches.  I quickly began to feel my age hiking in the altitude with the beginnings of a...

In the midst of all the terror that is visiting our cities and streets today it is easy for one to decide that God has abandoned us.  The truth is that He is desperately trying to get our attention.  I think we are in that period that Peter spoke of in his second epistle 3:9 "The Lord does not delay His promise as some understand delay, but is PATIENT with you, not wanting any to perish but all to come to repentance."   God's patience is being extended to us and He is allowing events to happen that pushes us toward repentance.  One of the most memorized and quoted verses in the OT is 2 Chronicles 7:14 "and if My people who are called by My Name humble themselves, pray and seek My face, and turn from their evil ways, then I will hear from heaven, forgive their sin and heal their land."   Notice that the verse begins with a lowercase letter which indicates that it is the continuation of the previous verse which is almost always left out when this passage is preach...

Today is Independence Day, 2016.  Our office is closed; I slept past 6:30; I have no agenda for the day except to get a walk and a work out done.  The thought just crossed my mind to drive over to Lakeview Drive and do my walking there.  Sounds like a plan. The only problem with these thoughts is that my mind is programmed to work.  After almost 65 years of working (I had my first job at age 13) it is difficult for me to encounter a day with no agenda.  I think that is why I don't really "unplug" until about half way through a two week vacation. The big thing I'm going to attempt today is to spend less time in front of the "boob-tube".  That seems to be my "go-to" thing when I have some down time.  So...here is the plan that is emerging; Walk in a different locale and pray as I walk Work out at the fitness center Spend less time in the recliner in front of the TV Read Take a nap Enjoy fellowship with my wife I hope I'm able to pull th...

I'm sure that most of you have been in a shopping mall and looked at a Mall Directory.  There will always be a little symbol with the words "You are here" to help you locate where in the Mall you are.  From there you can plot your course to a particular store.  It is too bad that many people have no idea of where we are in our country these days.  Some think that we are in good shape so far as jobs and personal finances are concerned.  Others feel exactly the opposite.  Some are absolutely sure that if only the right party or the right person gets in office that we will be fine.  The time has come for us to locate where we are so that we can navigate to where we want to be. The reality is that we are alienated from God.  When I say "we" I'm talking about our country, the United States of America.  We daily violate the laws of God and have even enacted federal laws to insure that we continue to violate God's Law.  ("Thous shalt not kill"...