As I prepared for my message (54:20) this past week, I gave a lot of thought to the role of emotions in the Christian’s life. How much do we rely on them? What weight should we give them in assessing our spiritual health? Is the presence of deep emotion the sign of deep spirituality or…
Category: Devotions/Biblical Insights
Is living in peace your priority?
Are you actively pursuing peace in your life? It usually takes great intentionality and always humility. Let’s be honest, neither of those comes easy. Conflict is exhausting and pride is strong. Even so, living in real peace is a worthy prize — something I’m trying to focus on and improve in my own life and…
Book Recommendation: The Songs of Jesus (A Year of Daily Devotions in the Psalms)
The Songs of Jesus: A Year of Daily Devotions in the Psalms read.amazon.com This Sunday at The Gathering, we kick off our annual Summer preaching series “Summer Under the Psalms”, a multi-year “walk” straight through all 150 Psalms. In light of that, I’d like to recommend a book to you that will help you if you…
Meditation for Today: Grace
I have found that the idea of grace is a wonderful concept to think about but a whole ‘nother thing to live! In my own life, I find that I don’t like to give myself grace. Let me rephrase that: I want to give myself grace—I just usually don’t. I am often my own…
Light
“The Son of grace shines the light of his grace into the darkest recesses of our hearts, not as an act of vengeance or punishment, but as a move of forgiving, transforming, and delivering grace. He dispels our self-inflicted darkness because he knows that we cannot grieve what we do not see, we cannot confess…
No, Life is Not Out of Control
This is certainly a timely message for my family. Maybe it is for yours, as well. When the unimaginable or unplanned happens; when the storms of life bear down on our homes, we’re tempted to panic or assume life is out of control. Here’s the Truth: It never is. I want to share a reading…
A Daily Devotional Recommendation: New Morning Mercies
Looking for a new devotional for 2019? I can’t recommend this one by Paul David Tripp enough! My wife, Karen, and I have been going through New Morning Mercies together over the last couple of years and found it rich with encouragement, grace, and spiritual insights. Today, we started through it again. Thoroughly Gospel-centered, Paul…
Some Quick Thoughts on Fear
Fear is one of the most crippling things in life. It causes us to fall back in the face of opposition or danger. It prevents us from taking advantage of great opportunities that could alter our lives for the good. It leads us to play it safe when anything worth having involves some level of…
Shelved Blessings
How happy are you right now? Seriously, are you over-the-moon kind of crazy-happy in your life? Blessed? Certainly, better than you deserve, but do you experience real blessing in your life such that you are overwhelmed at how good life is…how good God has been to you? Sometimes, the blessings of life seem to hide…
Owned
This is a passage that, if you consider it honestly and seriously, will rock your world and radically change your priorities: Luke 12:31-34 But seek His kingdom, and these things will be provided for you. Don’t be afraid, little flock, because your Father delights to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions and give to…
Perspective on Possessions
From, For the Love of God, by D. A. Carson: “You’ve seen the bumper sticker: “The person with the most toys wins.” Wins what? The person with the most toys takes out of this life exactly what everyone else does. A billion years or so into eternity, how many toys we accumulated during our seventy…
A Morning Meditation
“There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” Romans 8:1 This is an amazing passage, especially in light of the fact that Paul has just concluded chapter 7 by talking of the war that wages within us; of the struggle, as Christ-followers, to do what we want to do, all…
Morning Encouragement
Remember my affliction and my wanderings, the wormwood and the gall! 20 My soul continually remembers it and is bowed down within me. 21 But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: 22 The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases;[b] his mercies never come to an end; 23 they are new every morning; great is…
Prone to Wander, Lord I Feel it
“How can I pardon you? Your children have forsaken me and have sworn by those who are no gods. When I fed them to the full, they committed adultery and trooped to the houses of whores. Jeremiah 5:7 I am no one to throw stones or cast desparaging opinions on this people. I, too, am…
God’s Gift of People
I was studying in 2 Timothy 4 this morning where in verse 9, Paul tells Timothy to “do your best to come to me soon.” Clearly, as Paul goes on in that passage, some things have not gone well. He has been abandoned by everyone, even having one guy, Alexander the Coppersmith, doing him “great…
The Equipping Work of God
Our folks at The Gathering have heard me say quite often, “What God calls you to, He equips you for.” I thoroughly believe that. Ephesians 2: 10 affirms that “we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” So, He’s definitely called us. …
Reflecting on a Purpose-filled Life
You, however, have followed my teaching, my conduct, my aim in life, my faith, my patience, my love, my steadfastness, 11 my persecutions and sufferings that happened to me at Antioch, at Iconium, and at Lystra—which persecutions I endured; yet from them all the Lord rescued me. 12 Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life…
When It’s Good to be in a Gang
Paul tells Timothy that if anyone cleanses himself from what is dishonorable, “he will be a vessel for honorable use, set apart as holy, useful to the master of the house, ready for every good work.” (2 Timothy 2:20-21) This is a concept I’ve been dealing with a lot lately in messages at The Gathering,…
Conversational Scripture Reading
Have you ever tried praying Scripture back to God? I’m talking about actually speaking the text back to Him using conversational pronouns (I may have just made that term up, but you get the point), for example, changing “He” and “the Lord” to “You”. It makes for an amazing prayer and worship time. Give it a…
Important Perspective
“O Lord, I am a shell of dust, but animated with an invisible rational soul and made anew by an unseen power of grace.” Excerpt from The Valley of Vision: A Collection of Puritan Prayers and Devotions, p. 166
Season After Season
I’m sitting on my back porch looking out at the incredible colors of Fall all around me, taking in the fresh air and reflecting on just how good God really is in spite of what a punk I really am. Humbling. As the breeze blows through, I am thinking about how just one short month…