See, I am setting before you today a blessing and a curse. Deuteronomy 11.26 It’s not just Moses. Whenever you preach the Gospel, you set a blessing and a curse before the people. Unless you have issues, you’d rather preach about blessings, but blessings are to curses as sunrise is to night. The brilliance of […]
Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Matthew 21.9 The Law of Inverse Proportionality states that the more excited a visitor is after their first Sunday the less likely they are to be attending one year later. In Jesus’ case, it didn’t even take a week. Of course, when his people […]
My soul longs, even faints for the courts of the Lord. Psalm 84.2 That longing is part of our first vocational inklings. Other parts of ministry draw us in, but the pedestrian majesty of a room full (even half-full) of ordinary people gathered in God’s presence is uniquely compelling. Once those inklings become a calling, […]
And you returned and wept before the LORD, but the LORD did not listen to your voice or give year to you. Deuteronomy 1.45 Those words were written to people who grew up in the wilderness watching their parents die wandering in between Passover and Conquest. If there was ever a new generation that had legitimate complaints with the last, this was it. We’ve lived our versions of desert wandering, but God’s […]
There were many in the assembly who had not consecrated themselves. 2 Chronicles 30.17 Yet, they celebrated Passover anyway. Sadly, there’s a lot of stupid worship on Sundays in America. Your job today is to make sure none of it’s in your church but don’t forget there’s more than one kind of stupid. According to […]
I endure everything for the sake of the elect. 2 Timothy 2.10 The perseverance of the saints is a matter of debate in the Church, but everyone knows a shepherd who left ministry. Maybe things are going well for you, and Sundays are the best days. Maybe they aren’t and you just need the job. […]
…take every thought captive to obey Christ. 2 Corinthians 10:5 All doesn’t always mean all, but in this case every means every. This intense passage models the minister’s response to the manifold voices that seduce and distract his people. Every day they hear from false teachers in the Church, the marketplace, the academy and […]
He made an altar of bronze, twenty cubits long and twenty cubits wide and ten cubits high. 2 Chronicles 4:1 The “he” in question is King Solomon, last referred to by name in chapter 3:1. The intervening verses refer to David’s son over and over again, as the “he” who built the Temple and its […]
Give ear, O my people, to my teaching; incline your ears to the words of my mouth! Psalm 78.1 Asaph had something to say and the people needed to listen. And listen they would for another seventy-one verses. The next six are very hopeful. He’s sure that these words will change everything. Generations still unborn will hear them and obey. Without doubt, Asaph meant every word, but the next […]
Go, call your husband. John 4.16 So much has been made of Jesus’ gentleness with the woman at the well, that it is easy to miss the potential harm of his words. He knew all about her and still he sent her to get the husband he knew she didn’t have. And then, he went […]
