I am a lot like Dave in some ways. We both serve in states that are out of the main core of the SBC. We both serve in an office that has a title with no real power beyond our ministry as pastors (admittedly his is a much bigger office with no real power than mine). We both dislike the culture of argumentative combativeness that comes with the territory seemingly of the blogosphere. But I remind myself that it could always be worse. Yesterday, I ran across an article that reminded me just how true this statement is. At least we find ourselves arguing over issues that are debatable in … [Read more...] about It Could Be Worse
Social Issues
You Don’t Need Permission to Change
Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened. -- Matthew 7:7-8 It was in a summer in the '60s in the steamy hot apartment-laden suburb of Houston that I first became aware that change was actually sometimes in you and of you, and not just something others did to you. Up to that point, change had been dependent upon a parent's whim or job, or the ebb and flow of family income. We might live in a house with a nice big yard and a barking … [Read more...] about You Don’t Need Permission to Change
Changing Hearts and Changing Votes
A few simple propositions… Our task, as Christians, is working together with God to change people’s hearts, not change their votes. We don’t change people’s votes in order to change their hearts. But neither do we change people’s hearts IN ORDER to change their votes. We change people’s hearts in order to change their hearts, and to bring God glory. Once someone’s heart is changed, it may well affect the way they vote. But that is between them and God. A disproportionate emphasis on changing people’s votes may become a stumbling block that gets in the … [Read more...] about Changing Hearts and Changing Votes
The Summer of the Bully in the Barn
He is jealous for me Loves like a hurricane I am a tree Bending beneath the weight of His wind and mercy When all of a sudden I am unaware of these Afflictions eclipsed by glory And I realize just how beautiful you are and How great Your affections are for me -- John Mark MacMillan Summer is upon us again. Hurricanes and thunderstorms, sleeping late and stargazing, sunburns and swimming pools, watermelon and homemade ice cream, lazy days where sameness feels like security and days that change us forever, slipping in beneath the haze of heat to catch us … [Read more...] about The Summer of the Bully in the Barn
Lead Us Not Into Confusion
If we had it to do all over again We'd make so much better decisions. Only opening doors we should enter in Building lives without all the pretensions. With character above reproaching, And no reason to second-guess, With this sin no longer encroaching Doing nothing we need to confess. And, if they had the chance to redo it, Might forgiveness be not so held back? And peace found by those who pursue it? Would grace not be calling us back? The "we's" and the "they's" can begin again When both set aside all the fear, So the broken begin to mend from within While the … [Read more...] about Lead Us Not Into Confusion
President Obama Takes Brokenness to the Bank
“This is something that, you know, we’ve talked about over the years and she, (Michelle) you know, she feels the same way, she feels the same way that I do. And that is that, in the end the values that I care most deeply about and she cares most deeply about is how we treat other people and, I, you know, we are both practicing Christians and obviously this position may be considered to put us at odds with the views of others.” -- President Barack Obama , announcing his personal support, as a Christian, for the legalization of gay marriage. "God is the author of marriage, and we will not let … [Read more...] about President Obama Takes Brokenness to the Bank
“At the Statue of Jesus, Turn Left”
As more decades descend upon my timeline, my confusion about the perfect randomness of God, as He demonstrates His all-knowingness, does not unravel, but remains tightly wound, safely bound by trust. I often do not know how or why His will is what it is, and my clarity remains unclear on the entire "God allows" issue. I only know He does . . . and He knows why. And I trust. God is not random. God is God. This is, after all, His world, not mine; in His hands, not mine; His creation . . . not mine. No matter what I have to say about this world, He spoke it into existence. And, in a world … [Read more...] about “At the Statue of Jesus, Turn Left”
Dear Christian: You’re Scaring Them to Death
Sometimes the distances between what people know of you . . . and what they think of you . . . and what you know of yourself . . . and what you think of yourself . . . and what is true of all of this knowledge and all of these thoughts when sifted out seems as vast as the entire universe. I wonder if God didn't just create all the stars and solar systems for a practice run, knowing that the humans-to-come would be much more difficult to put into motion and save from colliding. We don't orbit well. We want to be the center of our own universe; we choose carefully who gets into our … [Read more...] about Dear Christian: You’re Scaring Them to Death
A Bridge Between Night and Day
In the soft moonlight of midnight, shadows dancing against the baby-blue wall of the nursery from a cottonwood tree moving gently in the nighttime breeze, it is party time. The baby is awake and searching for his toes, his pacifier, his blanket, his mommy or his daddy. He is ready for his day to begin; he wants to explore. Yes . . . in the soft moonlight of midnight. Smiling, cooing, laughing. In the first 10 years of our marriage, Lisa and I had five babies: four boys and then, a daughter. It was common among them to go through a period when they would have their nights and days … [Read more...] about A Bridge Between Night and Day
Remember Who You Are
God is not human, that he should lie, not a human being, that he should change his mind. Does he speak and then not act? Does he promise and not fulfill? Numbers 23:19 Flee. Run. Hide. Seek. Turn. Emerge. Rinse and repeat? For too many people, life has become an extended game of playground freeze tag. There they stand, scattered around like trees in winter, fixed and flash-frozen either as they have been proclaimed to be by someone more righteous, or as they in their brokenness project themselves to be, perhaps in a state of readiness to run at the first approach . . . or in … [Read more...] about Remember Who You Are