Ecclesiastes 12:10

    There is such a thing as a reasonable lack of belief. Maybe you’re from Missouri and you have to be shown.  Or perhaps, you just don’t know enough to know. Faith comes by hearing, but how can they hear if not one tells them (Romans 10:14).    Yet that isn’t the reason for most people's unbelief in God.   You see, God has made himself and his will known. The truth is out there. He was made proof of who He is through His Son. His word is clear, verifiable, and eternal.   The lack of belief is a choice. We don’t believe because we choose not to.   There are lots of reasons for that. Maybe it’s social pressure (John 12:42). Maybe they are caught up in their own bias (John 7:5). Maybe they just refuse to see what was right in front of them (John 12:37). Maybe they were just stubborn. Maybe they are just lazy (Belief without action isn’t belief, James 2:17)   Doesn’t matter why; the result is the same, and it’s not good. Unbelief will...

  We often use part of our body to emphasize certain actions.   Put your back into it!   Use your head!   Open your ears!  It is a way that we illustrate the need for more focus and effort.  In Romans 10:10, Paul does something similar. Here he writes, “ for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation .  You can just believe in a lackluster way; you must do it from the heart. You can just think that Jesus is Lord, you must utter the words.  That is why true faith isn’t just something you settle into; you have to mean it. A faith that is basic won’t save you.  We hear the Bible speak of people who believed in Jesus but were not confessing Him(John 12:42). People who knew the truth but didn’t want to change (Mark 10:22). Some say they believe in him yet don’t accept baptism(Mark 16:16).  Is this really faith? A least it’s not the faith t...

  As Dale Jenkins wrote: “Faith is a little like paint. As long as it’s in the can, it isn't much. Left in the can long enough a gallon of paint will ruin. Faith left unpracticed and unexercised will too….  You can’t just talk about faith.  To be effective, you must be living it out. So take the paint out of the can and start painting.”   The Bible says in James 2:18,”  But someone may well say, "You have faith and I have works; show me your faith without the works, and I will show you my faith by my works . " Faith is something that only works when it is used. If our faith doesn’t do anything, is it really there at all?   Truly “ living by faith ” isn’t just a proclamation we make but one we live in how we walk and talk, how we live and interact, and what we say but also what we do.  Is our faith canned? Is it something we have if we go looking for it? Or is it something that is being used daily in our lives?   Does your faith color eve...

  Nobody likes to be left out. There is a very subtle but very powerful influence on us to fit in with the group. If we are excluded, we tend to migrate to another group that will proclaim “We never want to be with those folks in the first place!”   But that isn’t true. We want to belong. To be accepted. Part of what C.S. Lewis called the Inner Ring. Those that are “In”.  We may want to be there but it might not be where Christ is. Therefore Jesus also, that He might sanctify the people through His own blood, suffered outside the gate.    So, let us go out to Him outside the camp, bearing His reproach . Hebrews 13:12-13    Christ’s mission required him to not follow the norm or go with the crowd. His sacrifice required him to ‘ go outside the camp ’. Not to do what had always been done. Not to please the keepers of the status quo. Not to be like everyone else. He had to set out to go a way that had not been done.   And ...

    I n Psalms 37:1  we read, “ Do not fret because of evildoers, Be not envious toward wrongdoers ”. It’s a good warning because that is exactly what we do.   Think about it. How many times do we see folks that are beside themselves about worldly shenanigans? They obsess about the evil they see to the point they make themselves miserable.     On the other side of the coin, we have those that feel like they are missing out. They look at a world that does what it wants when it wants and deep-down wishes that could be them. Forget about the consequences. They feel they are suffering because they can’t live like the world.   Yet both of these reactions are not faith responses. Consider what said the next few verses down; “ For evildoers will be cut off, But those who wait for the LORD, they will inherit the land. Yet a little while and the wicked man will be no more; And you will look carefully for his place and he will not be there ”. When we fret ...

     When the American colonies forced the British to surrender at Yorktown, it might be tempting to think they were then a new nation, but that isn’t what happened.   While they might now be independent, it didn’t mean the troubles were over.   The colonies were not united, and debts were growing. Solider laid siege to Congress demanding back pay. George Washington would say at this time, “ It is yet to be decided whether the Revolution must untimely be considered a blessing or a curse “.   From these early difficulties, the new nation was formed. The early struggles help to show these people what would be needed to achieve the lofty standards that the Rebellion had proclaimed. Even 200 years later the United States is still working to be the nation they fought and died for it to be.   I think there is a parallel to our life as a Christian. When we obey the Gospel and arise from the water of baptism, we in essence have won the war over sin and ...

   Paul was worried about the brethren in Thessalonica. He barely had any time with them before circumstances have driven him from the city. Paul had wanted to return to them but Satan had kept that from happening. All he really wanted to know was ‘were they faithful”?     Finally when he receives the news from Timothy that yes they were Paul is overjoyed. It had been a tough time for him. Mistreatment, suffering, accusation, setbacks had plagued his efforts. Yet when he hears from the brethren are on the right track, he is comforted. He says in 1 st Thessalonians chapter three verses seven and eight: “for this reason, brethren, in all our distress and affliction we were comforted about you through your faith;   for now we really live, if you stand firm in the Lord.”   Do you want to make a minister quit? Do you want to break an elder? Do you want to burn out a preacher? It’s not the long nights or the hard choices that do it. It isn’t tight budgets ...

  The period of Judges lasts for close to 350 years. During this time men (and a woman) were raised up by God to free his people and bring them back to him (Judges 2:16-20). It never seemed to work.   The people wanted the freedom but not the faith required to sustain it.   We know a good deal about a few of the Judges (the majority of the book of Judges deals with Barak/Deborah, Gideon, Jephthah, Samson). But mostly we have a record of major events, a bit about their families, the battles they fought, the length of their reign. Their names are a little more than a footnote in history.   That seems rather odd. These were people of significate in their time and a major factor in the history of Israel. Why don’t we have more?   It’s because the story isn’t the history of Israel thought that is what is taking place. It is the story of God’s plan for mankind. It tells that tell us not only what he is doing but the why of it.   The peri...

  I believe in God. For some, that is the mantra of faith. There is nothing else needed. No church, no doctrine, no plan, no action. As long as someone acknowledges the existence of deity, that is all that is required to have faith.   However, that isn’t what the scriptures teach. You believe that God is one. You do well; the demons also believe, and shudder James 2:19    James tells us the demons believe. Paul in his expose of the fall of man from God in Romans 1 doesn’t say man denies God’s existence but rather tries to replace God’s true nature with one more fitting with man’s desires.   Rather than say there is no God they instead say No to God.   The Hebrews writer tells us that faith is more than just a simple belief in God: And without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him. Hebrews 11:6     It’s not just belief in God ...

  It’s a popular new credo in the world today, ‘ I’m spiritual but not religious’ . Whereas religion is seen as old fashion and conformist, spirituality is seen as individualistic and hip. A person defines their beliefs by themselves and not by what some group lays down. The motto comes from the idea that people don’t want to view themselves as vapid in terms of moral thinking and merely physically minded yet don’t want to be hindered by adopting a preset set of convictions.     Yet it doesn't seem to be working out well for people. A study in The Journal of Nervous Disease by Jeffrey Vittengl found that those that define themselves this way may not be happy about it. The risk of depression was over a third greater than for those saw themselves as spiritual but not religious [i] . While religion has been shown over the years to have significant positive effects on people’s mental well-being, this study showed that just being spiritual didn’t have the same results. ...

  You remember in school when they taught you about the states of matter. How water can exist as solid, a liquid or a gas.  It’s still water but has very different properties and behaves in very different ways depending on the state it is in.  I guess it is a lot like religion in that way.   Some religious are liquid.  They are very fluid.  They move accordingly when the world tilts right or left.  While they have a form of substance, but that substance is shaped by whatever surrounds it.  They conform to the world. ( Romans 12:1-2; Colossians 2:23 )   Some religious are gas like.  They are just a lot of air.  They can only be felt and contain nothing solid.  They drift from here to there, and unless you’re paying close attention, you would never even notice that they are there.  On occasion, the air gets really hot but that is something else entirely. ( Ephesians 4:14, 5:6 )   Then some religion is ...

  Simon wasn’t very good at his job.  For most folks, fishing is a hobby a good time on the lake even if you get skunked.  Not so for the professional fisherman. A day without a catch means no product to sell, no money collected, and nothing to bring home to the wife and kids. Those days seemed to happen a lot to Simon.   Maybe I’m wrong but all I can go by is the history we have on him and every time we have it recorded, he caught nothing, at least on his own. You would have to be hard headed to keep at it with all that failure. No wonder he got the nickname of rock.   So perhaps, that’s why when he got the chance at a new career he jumped at it. Well, not so much a new career but a different form of the old one. He would still be fishing just going after a different kind of fish.  This time he would have a boss, one that had shown him, even in his old job, a better way to do things. And that made all the difference.   Simon didn’t al...

John Pemberton was brilliant.  You would have to be to earn a medical degree at age nineteen, start up eighteen companies and own a research lab recognized as the best in the state of Georgia. Yet this brilliant chemist is probably most remembered for the one invention he stupidly let slip away.   In 1888, John invented a wine drink that he tried to sell as mouthwash.  As mouthwashes go it wasn’t all that good but it did taste good, so he began selling it as a drink.  He decided to incorporate his soft drink company but after the first year, sales weren’t that good.  He sold seventy five dollars’ worth of the stuff that cost him fifty dollars to make. So in order to make some money to pursue other interests, he sold the company to an employee for a mere $2,300.   Ten years later, sales were better. Coca Cola, the company he started to sale the drink by the same name was now the number one drink in the country.   Short term think...

  When you look at groups that immigrated to the US, it’s not hard to tell they tended to congregate in certain regions or cities.  As these groups took hold of a place you can see why people might flock to that area as they would share a language or might have some family ties. But how did it start?   For example, why did so many Irish immigrants to America settle in Boston rather than New York? The answer is very simple: The boat fare was $ 6.50 cheaper.   It amazes me how many decisions that are made, that turn out to have a great effect, are often made for trivial reasons.  My wife chose the college, where we would eventual meet and get married, for the fact that it allowed freshman to not have a roommate. How different would my life be if she had been a little less reclusive?   The most important decision we make is our faith. How did we arrive at that decision? Is it because we considered the Bible teachings? Have we expl...

  Every preacher has one great sermon, that doesn’t mean he is a great preacher. A student can ace a test; it doesn’t mean he is going to pass the course. An athlete can have a great year, but that doesn’t mean he is going to the hall of fame.   In his autobiography of his stand-up career, Steve Martin had this to say: It was easy to be great. Every entertainer has a night when everything is clicking. These nights are accidental and statistical: Like lucky cards in poker, you can count on them occurring over time. What was hard was to be good, consistently good, night after night, no matter what the abominable circumstances .   Yet when it comes to faith some think differently. Faith is a moment. A once and done kind of thing. In the right place, at a certain time, when the mood is right, I will have faith and then that’s all I need. I really felt the presence of God. I was on a spiritual high. I was moved.  Faith is momentary.   That, ho...

For the last few months, it was Pokémon Go. Before that is was Flappy Birds. Before that, it was Angry Birds or Temple Run. That app that everyone is playing, at least for the moment.  Now everyone is on Instagram before that is was Facebook.  Before that it was Myspace.  Before that it was Xanga. The “it” social media site everyone was using.   O.K. maybe these references are too new for you, then think back to your pet rock, yo-yo, the Stretch Armstrong, Cabbage Patch Doll, or your pogo ball.  All those fads that were so hot that everyone just had to have them. But then just as fast as they faded in they faded right back out.   Unfortunately, the fad for many people isn’t a toy or a game but their faith. " In a similar way these are the ones on whom seed was sown on the rocky places, who, when they hear the word, immediately receive it with joy;  and they have no firm root in themselves, but are only temporary; then, ...

  What the biggest man-made structure?   You might be thinking Great Pyramids, the Great Wall of China, or the proposed Mubarak al-Kabir Tower, in Kuwait. However, those are all wrong…. maybe.   It’s hard to answer that question. What do we mean by biggest? Tallest? Widest? Takes up the most area?  Even the term man-made structure can be problematic.  What if we really weren’t planning on making it, yet we did anyhow does that count?   If that is the case, then the answer might just be Fresh Kills, a garbage dump on Staten Island, New York.  Opened in 1948, the Fresh Kills landfill site (named after the Dutch word kil, meaning “small river”) soon became one of the largest structure in human history, trumping (at least by volume) the Great Wall of China.  The site is 4.6 square miles in area and, when operational, twenty barges, each carrying 650 tons of rubbish, were shipped in every day. At its peak, the dump was already more ...

  It was a great nation.  One of the most powerful, wealthy, influential, and important kingdoms of it time.  But for the last several years, there were signs things were falling apart.  Marriage was under attack.  The case from government was marry whoever you want, there are no limits. That however wasn’t what God had said.  The heart of the leaders were moving away from God.   So now a time of choice came for the people.  Two leaders had emerged. Who would rule the land? The people had a choice to make, even if it seemed like either choice would be a mistake.     On one side, a person that had been in public service for a long time right in the middle of going on in the kingdom.  While there seemed to be some promise early, there were now some great concerns. This person would show a willingness to compromise God’s clear commands in order to keep power.  They used division and schemes to try and win the people...

    I've yet to meet the parent, myself included, that didn’t have a blind spot when it came to their little ones.  We think they are the most special perfect things that ever walked the planet.  Go to any little league game, kindergarten graduation or school recital and ask whose kid is the talented one is and everyone will raise their hands.  The only way the kid might make a catch is if the ball bounces off his head into his glove, but their parents will still see an all-star.  We love them too much for anything less.    So then, parents tend to go overboard when it comes to their children. We decorate our walls with pictures of them, brag about them to anyone who will (and some who won't) listen and are willing to do anything for them.  Sacrifice time, money, self, and all reason for them.  That’s what good parent do .  To ask a loving good parent to give up their kids would ludicrous.   But that's exactly what ...

   I don't know how He does it….    In all my years working as a minister, either as a preacher, youth minister or something in-between, the thing I have hated most about my job are the ones that fall away.  The people you taught, feed and worked beside, that later you hear that are no longer faithful.  When you ask about them and the response is: They aren't attending anywhere I know of , They left their spouse and ran off with someone else , They live now in some sin .      I hate looking back at the faces of all those I know knew the Truth, yet have somehow fallen in the error of the world.  It doesn't matter if I knew them for six minutes, six months or six years it hurts me.  But to be honest those I loved the most are always the hardest. Why? I know they believed! I know they cared! What happened? I know I taught them to watch out, there would be trying times. Why did they change? Why did they give up? Wha...