We are halfway through 2017, and from my personal readings for these six months, I have made my way through 15 non-fiction works and 8 fiction. Seven of those non-fiction books are part of a year and a half journey to reread the works of Francis Schaeffer who greatly influenced my spiritual growth while in college. Also to be found are a couple of commentaries. Instead of reading through the Bible as a whole in 2017, I decided to focus on four books, giving them three-months of attention each. Part of that is to read through a significant commentary for each book. January through June, I … [Read more...] about My Top Three Reads for the First Half of 2017
How we pray for those we know who aren’t followers of Jesus
As a pastor, I often ponder how my church can be more effective at sharing the love and gospel of Jesus with our community. Ours is not a large town. We are a community of roughly 1700 people in a county of around 18,000. This presents certain challenges to evangelism: many people are commuters, we don’t really have a “town center” where large numbers of people regularly gather (well, maybe the football field in the fall), and many people said a prayer and were baptized as a kid in VBS or the likes, so they don’t think they need anything else despite the fact that little in their life … [Read more...] about How we pray for those we know who aren’t followers of Jesus
The Great Things About Being a Pastor
It happened again several weeks ago, and it made me want to punch a hole in my computer screen. Thankfully, I had the restraint not to do so. Computers aren’t cheap. I was perusing my Facebook feed, and there it was—that link staring me in the face: An article at some blog talking about how pastoring is the most difficult thing you can do. Let me just state now to all you nurses, farmers, overnight factory workers, underpaid school teachers, etc., I apologize that such blogs exist. (I’m married to a nurse, I’ve pastored farmers and heard their stories, I know overnight blue-collar … [Read more...] about The Great Things About Being a Pastor
What Changed? (a question in light of Prestonwood Baptist’s decision to escrow gifts to the Cooperative Program)
Big news yesterday from the church of an ex-SBC president. Jack Graham said that Prestonwood Baptist has decided to “to escrow gifts previously forwarded to support Southern Baptist cooperative missions and ministries while the congregation discusses concerns about the direction of the Southern Baptist Convention,” according to Will Hall at the Baptist Message, the "news journal" of Louisiana Baptists. While each church has the right to determine how to support the cooperative efforts of the SBC, this particular decision takes on a more public light given Graham’s previous position as SBC … [Read more...] about What Changed? (a question in light of Prestonwood Baptist’s decision to escrow gifts to the Cooperative Program)
A Christian’s Response to President Trump’s Plan to Bar Syrian Refugees from Entering the United States
It was opening night of the Summer Olympics 2016. My then girlfriend, now wife, invited me to her apartment to join with some of her friends to watch the ceremonies and share a meal. Among those invited was a family, Syrian Kurds, who had been placed in Kansas City as part of the refugee resettlement program. Since they didn’t have a vehicle, we went over to their house to pick them up. As the ladies finished getting ready, the father talked about how grateful he was to come to the United States to get needed medical treatments for his children (the doctors they had been seeing in Syria had … [Read more...] about A Christian’s Response to President Trump’s Plan to Bar Syrian Refugees from Entering the United States
Be Excellent to Each Other (a call for a new year’s revolution)
Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure is one of those movies from my childhood that you would not typically think would be a source of wisdom. Yet, near the end, Bill S. Preston, Esq., utters a line that we need to hear today: “Be excellent to each other.” Funny how sometimes certain things in pop culture articulate a much-needed biblical truth…in their own way. Let’s face it, 2016 was a year of much vitriol, especially in a bitter political race. You had some Christian leaders seeming to question the spiritual maturity of those voting for one candidate, and others calling those not voting for … [Read more...] about Be Excellent to Each Other (a call for a new year’s revolution)
What’s your Bible reading plan for 2017?
Sixteen years ago, while in college, my church and Baptist Student Union challenged, encouraged, and held me accountable for something like no one had before: To read the Bible. I had been a Christian for 15 years leading up to that point. Along the way, I had bits and pieces of scripture embedded into memory. I would follow, in spurts, various reading plans that had a few verses here and a few there. But I had never actually devoted myself to read the whole of scripture, or even large chunks of it. And the spiritual illiteracy showed. But in the fall of 2000, that began to change. In that … [Read more...] about What’s your Bible reading plan for 2017?
O Little Town of Bethlehem (a Christmas meditation)
O little town of Bethlehem How still we see thee lie! Above thy deep and dreamless sleep The silent stars go by Yet in thy dark streets shineth The everlasting Light The hopes and fears of all the years Are met in thee tonight The song O Little Town of Bethlehem speaks to the great thing that came out of seeming insignificance. This is the very thing that happened with the birth of Jesus. When God sent his Son into the world to be our Savior-King, he chose insignificance. Yes, for Jesus to be a descendant of David, he had to be born to one of David’s relatives. We get this in both … [Read more...] about O Little Town of Bethlehem (a Christmas meditation)
Tomorrow I will vote, and I will vote my conscience
Tomorrow is election day, and what a year it has been leading up to this point. If anyone back then had said that the two major candidates would be Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, the rest of us would have nodded in agreement to the first prediction and shaken our heads and laughed at the second. Yet here we are. To call this election “contentious”, even among evangelicals, would be an understatement. I think most of us are ready for November 9 so we can see the end of robocalls, political ads on TV, and Facebook posts about how civilization as we know it will come to an end if either … [Read more...] about Tomorrow I will vote, and I will vote my conscience
“Baptism now saves you”—a consideration of 1 Peter 3:21
We Baptists have historically believed, as we should, that salvation is by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. Yet, in maintaining these solas, we occasionally come across a passage of Scripture that makes us take pause. One such scriptures is Peter’s treatment of baptism in 1 Peter 3. There we read how Peter compares baptism to the great flood: “Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you…” We are quick to cry out: “Now this doesn’t mean that getting dunked into water actually saves you,” lest we be accused of holding to a form of baptismal regeneration which doesn’t … [Read more...] about “Baptism now saves you”—a consideration of 1 Peter 3:21