March 10, 2010
The cover story of this week’s issue of The Economist is titled “Gendercide,” and highlights the massive gender gap in China, India, and other Asian and European countries due to gender-based abortions of female babies. Consider this staggering projection: in 10 years, China will have as many unmarried male adults as the United States has male [...]
March 2, 2010
There is a sacred hush about the Old Testament faith that is refreshing when compared to the barrage of noisy information that characterizes our day. Consider the awe-infused silence that the children of Abraham must have experienced as they saw Aaron and his sons consecrated as priests (Leviticus 8). Moses washed Aaron and his sons [...]
February 23, 2010
Last night we conducted our annual business meeting, where the congregation overwhelmingly affirmed Peter Kinkel and reaffirmed Don Vander Giessen as elders. I took some time to reflect on the year behind us, address some current issues, and look to the year ahead. Here is what I shared about the year ahead.
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What we have seen [...]
February 16, 2010
Next Thursday, February 18th, we will have our annual business meeting in which we vote on issues such as the 2010 budget and confirm eldership for Peter Kinkel and Don Vander Giessen. It may be tempting to understand these items as the centerpiece of our meeting. Yet our desire is that the meeting be much [...]
February 9, 2010
Sacrificial love in the family of God is a beautiful thing. When one person uses his or her Spirit-enabled gifts “for the common good” (1 Cor 12:7), when the various members “have the same care for one another” (1 Cor 12:25), what emerges is the most attractive display of God’s own character that can be [...]
February 3, 2010
In our Bible reading plan we recently witnessed the “gospel event” of the Old Testament, Israel’s exodus from Egypt. One of the striking features leading up to the exodus is the cosmic nature of the conflict between Moses and Pharaoh. Before the showdown began, God told Moses, “See, I have made you like God to [...]
February 3, 2010
As we walk through 1 Corinthians 12-14 on Sunday mornings, one thing we have seen already and will see again this Sunday is the radical Christ-centeredness of the Holy Spirit’s ministry. The Spirit’s initial work in our lives is to enable us to confess, “Jesus is Lord!” (12:3) as he baptizes us into Christ, bringing [...]
February 3, 2010
Earlier this week I heard of an Arizona church in which the decisions and direction of the church were made by a board of directors. One Sunday a board member made the announcement in church, “Some of our board members have decided to step down from their responsibilities, so we have a few positions open. [...]
January 8, 2010
Since many of us have begun reading through the Bible in 2010, I wrote last week about why we read the Bible, namely, to be shaped by God’s story more than the values we imbibe from our culture. As crucial as this is, it stands next to an equally significant purpose in reading God’s word: [...]
January 8, 2010
God is writing a story. Not in the sense that a novelist creates fictional characters and places, or even in the sense that a playwright or screenwriter develops a script that people actually act out. The world we find ourselves in-nature, people, time, relationships-this is all part of the story that God has been writing [...]
