Posts with the category “message-series”
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Chapters
March 1st, 2023
Imagine standing in the corner of the room as the scene plays out. We are here to listen, to observe and learn.
Solomon enters; he kneels beside the bed of his father, David. Years have shrunk to hou... Read More
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Shepherds, Thieves and Heirs
February 22nd, 2023
It started in secret, but David’s sin that began behind closed doors was beginning to seep out from the cracks. Nothing could stop it. Not even the body of a dead man. The prophet came to him with a p... Read More
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Six Steps
February 15th, 2023
Todd Henry wrote, “It’s possible to succeed your way into failure when you lose sight of the bigger picture” (emphasis added). Mr. Henry was making the point that in our work lives we can get so caugh... Read More
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Is Your Back Against the Wall?
February 8th, 2023
Ever had those moments? When it seems there is no way out of a tough situation? Young David was being falsely accused and chased by King Saul in Psalm 57. As you know, Saul and his men came into the c... Read More
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Beside Still Waters
February 1st, 2023
There is a bench with an iron back and wooden slats. The arms curve downward like a ram’s horn. It sits at the edge of deep water that’s fed by a spring beneath the earth. The pool is aquamarine in th... Read More
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A Giant Killer
January 26th, 2023
It was a rough day for Israel. Encamped along the battle lines opposing the Philistine army, they had listened to the taunts of a giant. They had listened and they were afraid - cowering in their self... Read More
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The King We Need
January 17th, 2023
Samuel filled his horn with oil and made his way to Bethlehem, with thoughts swirling in his head. It wasn’t long ago he had anointed Israel’s first king. Had it really gone wrong this quickly? At fir... Read More
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Lessons from the Upper Room
October 24th, 2022
As Peter wrote to the early church about brotherly affection and love, I wonder if he was remembering words he had heard in an upper room. He sat at the Passover table the night before Jesus’s death a... Read More
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A Prayer for Our Church
October 18th, 2022
If I were to pray just one prayer for our church, it would be the words of this verse. In my opinion, it covers everything we need: hearts that are (1) convinced of the love of God, and (2) gripped by... Read More
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Pressing On
October 12th, 2022
Eleven years ago, when we lived in Missouri, I decided to challenge myself in recognition of my 50th birthday. I signed up for a marathon. I had been running some - 5-milers mainly, but I was nowhere ... Read More
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To Know Him Is to Love Him
October 3rd, 2022
I’d known him my whole life. I knew he was the youngest of three brothers. I knew where he went to church and school and who his best friends were. I knew he played guitar and lifeguarded at the pool.... Read More
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Better Than the Book
September 27th, 2022
The word virtue brings me back to a heavy, tan book from my childhood. On road trips to visit my grandparents in the Texas panhandle, my mother would read us stories from The Book of Virtues. It was f... Read More
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Work Boots
September 20th, 2022
My family wasn’t big on ceremony, but I remember two events that marked the entryway into the grown-up world for my brothers and me. The first, which came when we turned twelve (or so) years old, was ... Read More
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It's Time for a Walk
April 18th, 2022
One of the great scenes in the Bible, on the other side of Jesus’ resurrection, has to be what happened on the road to Emmaus. A couple of Jesus followers are on a walk. Like many people do when they’... Read More
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Our Only Hope on Holy Week
April 11th, 2022
Death is a somber cloud that hangs over Holy Week. I know Sunday is coming. I know that Christ will not stay in the ground. Yet I also know that every passing Easter finds me a year closer to my own g... Read More
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The God Who Seeks
April 5th, 2022
Zacchaeus was a wee little man and a wee little man was he. He climbed up in a sycamore tree for the Lord he wanted to see. And as the Savior passed that way, He looked up in that tree. And he said, “... Read More
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Almost
March 30th, 2022
A religious person is not necessarily a born-again person—even when their religion is steeped in the gospel. I know because I was one, an “almost” Christian.... Read More
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The Gain Is In The Loss
March 22nd, 2022
We have no idea what Christ has for us on the other side of self-denial. Much of what we see in the moment of decision appears to be loss, like God is intent on taking something away from us. He’s cut... Read More
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Jesus and the Women
March 15th, 2022
There’s a lot of talk these days about gender equality.
But that was not the case in the first-century world that Jesus was born into. Women were routinely treated as second-class citizens with dimin... Read More
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When Suffering Prolongs
March 8th, 2022
In Luke 7, Jesus does something incredible. He goes out of His way to raise the only son of a widow from the dead. Here, we see His great compassion for us in the midst of our suffering, and we see Hi... Read More
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How to Impress Jesus
March 2nd, 2022
Have you ever stopped to think what it would take to truly impress Jesus? I mean, He created everything that ever was! He existed before all things and holds everything together (Col. 1:17) so could t... Read More
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The Walmart Lady and Jesus
February 22nd, 2022
We were walking out of Walmart when she approached us. Right away, we could tell she was quite different from us in every way. She asked for a ride home across town, but it was obvious she needed so m... Read More
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The Power of an Encounter
February 15th, 2022
Charlie Taylor is not a familiar name to most, but if you were to ask his friends, they probably would have described him as a quiet man who loved mechanical things. Some others considered him a mecha... Read More
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Glimpses of the Kingdom
February 8th, 2022
James K.A. Smith says, “we can’t not be desiring some kingdom”.[1] Woven into the fabric of our existence is a longing for how we ought to live and how the world around us ought to be. Smith suggests ... Read More
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Thy Kingdom Come
February 1st, 2022
There are whispers going through the Nazareth synagogue today. Joseph’s son has returned to His hometown and stands for a Sabbath reading. He’s handed the scroll of Isaiah and finds just the passage H... Read More
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Light & Life to All He Brings
December 7th, 2021
It was just an ordinary December night when she asked, “Mommy, does everybody switch families?”
The tree lights sparkled behind her as she snuggled deeper into the couch and waited for my answer.... Read More
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The Spark We Need to Choose to Serve God
November 9th, 2021
We will never choose to serve a God we don’t believe has delivered us.
We might make overtures. We might try because it seems right. We might even actually serve in some capacity for a season. But to... Read More
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Pray for the Impossible
November 1st, 2021
I’ve often heard that God is willing and able to give us so much more than we could ever imagine; we just never ask. What surprises me about Joshua chapter 10 is that God has already done so much for ... Read More
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A Covenant Renewed
October 26th, 2021
At the city of Ai, God used both defeat and victory to teach His children profound lessons about covenant relationships.
For starters they had the painful reminder that the benefits they enjoyed from... Read More
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Consecration
October 19th, 2021
Joshua 7 is always uncomfortable for me to read. One man sins, and his entire family pays the price for it. Oh, and 36 Israelites die in battle, too. It seems so harsh—to allow the whole nation to be ... Read More
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When Obedience Doesn’t Make Sense
October 6th, 2021
It was a new day for a new generation. After 40 long years in the wilderness, they were finally about to enter the promised land. And not without some fanfare. God had just shown off in a dramatic, Re... Read More
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Memorable Memorials in the Midst
September 28th, 2021
What makes a memorial memorable?
First, a memorial is truly memorable when it is God-ordained. Amid moving an entire nation from one side of a river to another on dry land, God told Joshua to send me... Read More
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Follow the High Priest
September 21st, 2021
When the Israelites arrived at the Jordan River as recorded in Joshua 3, it was their second time. Forty years earlier, their parents and grandparents had been at that place. And things didn’t go well... Read More
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It's Time
September 14th, 2021
We are all born in the middle of a story. We are not isolated simply to our moment or our generation but connected and influenced by the generations that have come before and, through our actions, inf... Read More
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Brokenness
September 6th, 2021
According to legend, sometime in the 15th century, a Japanese military commander broke his prized Chinese tea bowl. He sent it back to China in the hope that it could be repaired. When his tea bowl wa... Read More
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Exercising Trust
August 31st, 2021
I don’t usually like to write using sports analogies. As an athlete through high school and college, I heard my fair share of “life is like sports; sports are like life” anecdotes. However, in Paul’s ... Read More
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Drawing Near
August 23rd, 2021
Contrary to what his name suggests, my son Bear is a cuddler. Not just at bedtime either. He’s pretty much down to cuddle at any point in the day. To his mother’s delight, it’s been that way all 8 yea... Read More
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What Do You Want Jesus To Do For You?
August 3rd, 2021
Blind Bartimaeus was a beggar. There was little else for him to do. He could not see; therefore, he could not work. Begging by the roadside was his only livelihood. It might have been all he’d ever do... Read More
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But What Exactly Is Discipleship?
July 27th, 2021
“Go make disciples,” Jesus said. But, um… What exactly does that mean? Fair question. Discipleship can feel ambiguous and intimidating.... Read More
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Words
July 22nd, 2021
Our words, try as we might to fulfill them, sometimes return empty. We cancel plans, we let others down, or we bite off more than we can chew and come up short on what we have promised.... Read More
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