One Year Marriage Checkup
I’ve been married for just over a year so I’m still very much a newlywed. I recently started thinking about the things I had set out to do and be as a husband before we got married and realized that now was a good time for a marriage checkup.
Here are a few things for men to think about after their first year of marriage. Read more…
Is Our Faith In Jeopardy?
On April 15, a U.S. District judge issued a ruling declaring the official National Day of Prayer unconstitutional. The U.S. Department of Justice soon followed by stating that the Obama administration will appeal the decision. The National Day of Prayer and, to a larger extent, the role of faith in America are in jeopardy.
Conform To The Spirit
I wrote this as a note to myself a long time ago and thought I’d share it here on the blog. I hope someone finds it beneficial and edifying.
Let people look at you and admire the qualities you have that are a direct result of having Christ in you. Conform to the Spirit! Let it control your life. You belong to God and you are His child. Represent Him everyday because you carry His last name when you are called “Christian.” Represent your family that has adopted Read more…
4 Blunt Comments in the New Testament
Over the last decade Christianity has battled against the culture that says that Christians must be “nice.” A lot of men and women were taught that we can never be blunt or harsh. While I believe in kindness, grace and mercy there are times when being direct is exactly what God wants, even if it sounds mean.
There are some good examples of this in the New Testament. There are times that God wants us to be direct, even if it might be offensive to the other person. I like to imagine being with Jesus or the disciples or John the Baptist and hearing them make these comments. I think I would be surprised to hear these words come out of their mouth.
1. Luke 3:7: “You brood of vipers, who warned you of the wrath to come?”
These are the first words that John the Baptist speaks to the crowd that gathers to see him in Jordan. By calling them a brood of vipers he was saying that that are children of the devil.
Read more…
Be Blessed In The LORD
God wants to give us more. More of Himself, more revelation, more understanding. He desires us and wants us to dwell richly with Him. Jesus Himself wants us to walk along side Him and do His will.
But getting to that deep point of fellowship isn’t as easy as pushing the easy button. Jesus told us that we must enter through the narrow gate that few enter (Matt 7:13). What we are seeking is to walk in intimate fellowship with Lion of Judah (Rev 5:5), the Lamb that was slain (Rev 5:12) and the one that is described in Revelation 19:11-16 as:
Eyes like flames of fire
Clothed in a robe dipped in blood
He is called the Word of God
Armies of Heaven follow Him
From His mouth comes a sharp sword
On His robe and on His thigh He has a name written, King of kings and Lord of lords.
He is high and mighty and holy and perfect. He is worthy of all our praise and worship. What does He want from us?
I believe that He wants us to dig deep through our hearts and minds and find the things that are holding us back from Him. In us there are the things we do not want to give up, big or small. And there are the things we don’t want to do or are afraid to do. Most of us will know what is keeping us from going to the next level in our faith if we examine ourselves and look for these things.
Its only a start to confront them and give these things up. Changing our hearts and minds about the things we are afraid to do or be and the things we don’t want to stop doing will draw us cexercise/>loser to The LORD.
Simon the Magician: Motives & The Holy Spirit
Simon the magician had a large following. From what we can tell he really liked the attention. Acts 8:9-24 tells us that Simon had been practicing magic in Samaria and that he had amazed many people with the things he had done. The people said that he had the power of God and Simon himself boasted that he was someone great. Read more…
How to marry well
I married well, very well. Amy is a wonderful girl and she is perfect for me. I’m constantly reminded that she is a blessing from the Lord and that I don’t deserve her. I know that I did not get lucky because no one is this lucky. And I know it’s not because I made all the right moves during the dating process because I made my share of mistakes. I didn’t do everything right in searching for my wife so how did I find this wonderful woman?
Prayer. Sound so simple that you might just stop reading right now right? Well its more than just a single word. Read more…
American culture in the Philipians
In Philippians 3:17-19 Paul talks about how we ought to live. He starts by telling the Philippians to imitate him. Oh if we only had more Christian leaders that could say that, “imitate me.” We desperately need that leadership. We need to all strive to be person that can say like Paul that we have laid it all down, that we die daily and that others should imitate us. ALL of us are called to live a life that pleases The Lord in that way.
Verse 19 is what struck me as most interesting Read more…
Jesus’ example of humility
Jesus showed us what true humility is. It was such a huge event in time, such a life changing moment for all of us that we might forget to see the humility Christ demonstrated when He died on the cross for our sin. I find it very easy to just glance over the things that seem obvious in scripture without fully absorbing the truth behind the verse. In Philippians 2 Paul uses Christ’s example to help us see how humble He was when He gave His life for us.
Paul is trying to teach the Philippians to put aside their selfishness Read more…
We will pray for you
Starting today you will notice a new button on the website that let’s you submit prayer requests. I recently sent a tweet out that said “If you need prayer @ or DM me and my wife and I wil pray for you.” I got so many responses that it seemed like a good thing to make available 24×7.
So if you do have a prayer request you can submit them here. And we really will pray for you. You don’t have to leave your name but it would be nice to be able to pray for people by name. I hope it’s a blessing to those who need prayer.
Read more…