In a sermon a while back, I shared insights from Psalm 23. First, as David begins, he doesn?t say, ?The Lord is a Shepherd? (in a general way), or ?The Lord is the Shepherd? (in a definitive way), but ?The Lord is my Shepherd? (in a personal way). He doesn?t just shepherd the world of […]

?Christ is saying [in describing the church as the salt of the earth] that mild religion, far from being of partial value, is of utterly no value. We can lose our Christianity! It is easy to go on with the motions; it is easy to continue a structure; it is easy to go on with […]

?Jesus? methodology presents a challenge to the present-day culture of productivity, which demands a speedy programmatic approach for the process of making disciples.? (Keith R. Anderson & Randy D. Reese. Spiritual Mentoring: A Guide for Seeking & Giving Direction. Downer?s Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1999, p. 38.) Jesus? way was unhurried. He knew that good fruit […]

?When [the Jewish rulers and elders] saw the courage of Peter and John and realized that they were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished and they took note that these men had been with Jesus.? (Acts 4:13 NIV) This passage came to mind as I was reading from the journal of Elizabeth Leseur; a late […]

Like last Saturday, I?m continuing to share from Eugene Peterson?s Leap Over a Wall. Here he describes how life without God (what the Scriptures call ?sin?) is finite and eventually boring. ?We have a finite number of ways to sin; God has an infinite number of ways to forgive. After observing the human condition for […]

In his Manual for Interior Souls, Jean Grou offers a contrast between what he calls ?interior souls? and ?mercenary and self-interested souls.? ?We can understand also why these interior souls are hated and detested by mercenary and self-interested souls, although they may be otherwise virtuous and devout: it is because they are both traveling on […]