Category: Church Life
Five Ways Every Member Can Love and Strengthen the Church
If you want, you can pay someone to wash your car. You can pay someone to iron your clothes. You can pay someone to make food for dinner. You can even pay someone to take care of your children for large parts of the day. It...
Faith, Hope, and Love: Recovering the Essential Triad of Christian Living
We are called to be many things as Christians—generous, hospitable, disciplined, respectful. Each biblical characteristic is important and should be pursued wholeheartedly. But there is one set of characteristics—a triad of traits—that is foundational and essential: namely, faith, hope, and love. If we do not have...
Mommy Wars: Judging and Feeling Judged in a Diverse Body
Within a few hours of airing on YouTube, a Similac commercial called “Mother ‘Hood” went viral. In it, groups from several different mommy sub-cultures show up at a playground—nursing moms, bottle-feeding moms, businesswomen-moms, even baby-wearing-yoga moms. Battle lines are drawn immediately and insults fly. Eventually, just...
Finding Friendship in the Church: Moving Forward
The starting place of Christian friendship is the message of Christ crucified for us. In Christ, God has removed the barriers that keep us separated from him and from one another. As a result of the cross, we are now freed to pursue real friendships, even...
Purposeful Community
In the church, we need each other. This is a simple concept, but do we believe it? The New Testament teaches us that the church is an interdependent community. Each of us is dependent upon others to meet our needs, and each of us is responsible...
Finding Friendship in the Church: A Starting Place
Recently I read a clever question on social media: “When are we going to talk about the miracle of Jesus having 12 close friends in his 30s?” It was meant to be humorous, so I smiled, but inside I was frowning because the comment hit a...
His Truth Will Triumph Through Us
“We will not fear for God hath willed His truth to triumph through us.” This victorious line is found in the English version of Martin Luther’s famous hymn, “A Mighty Fortress is Our God.” It has often bolstered my faith. The truth is bigger than you...
A Church Without Love?
Seven messages from the Lord Jesus to seven local congregations in 1st-century Asia form the bulk of the opening chapters of the book of Revelation. They are a mix of warning, encouragement, rebuke and commendation, with each church receiving its own personalized blend from the sovereign...
Seven Ways Teens Can Contribute When the Church Meets
“How can I participate right away in the church?” That was a wonderful question to hear from a teenager who recently became a believer and joined our church. I don’t remember my exact answer, but I have since thought about that question primarily as it relates...
Charlatans, Heretics, and One-trick Ponies: The Danger of Theological Distractions
The Christian life is fraught with danger. There are the external dangers—overt persecution from those who hate Christ and would see his followers physically hindered, maligned, imprisoned, even killed. Then there are threats of a more insidious nature, doing their damage inside the mind of the...
