Mention anger in church and most people will say something like “well, Jesus did overturn the tables in the temple, right?” Almost as reactive balance, someone else will respond with “But isn’t anger one of the seven deadly sins?” We wonder if there are other ways...
We hear a lot of statistics these days about the growing number of people who are religiously unaffiliated. But, thanks to the Pew Research Center, we also get stats from time to time on people who are religiously active. For instance, one recent Pew research study...
In a Bible full of lists, the list of the fruits of the spirit in Galatians 5 is among the most inspiring and aspirational: … the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against...
One of the most unfortunately trivialized texts is Luke 10:38-42: 38 Now as they went on their way, he entered a certain village, where a woman named Martha welcomed him into her home. 39 She had a sister named Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet...
In the fourth chapter of Mark’s Gospel, Jesus tells a parable: Again Jesus began to teach beside the sea. Such a very large crowd gathered around him that he got into a boat on the sea and sat there, while the whole crowd was beside the...
Luke 17:11-19: 11 On the way to Jerusalem Jesus[a] was going through the region between Samaria and Galilee. 12 As he entered a village, ten lepers[b] approached him. Keeping their distance, 13 they called out, saying, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!” 14 When he saw them, he said to them, “Go and show yourselves...
The presentation to the mission committee offered a compelling case for funding clean water wells in Haiti and in Malawi. It seemed the committee was ready to allocate a significant part of its budget to this worthy endeavor. Then two members raised their hands. “What...
We haven’t talked yet about the setting for church meetings – how rooms are set up to achieve your goals for that meeting or even the meeting location. Location is especially crucial for mission committees, which is often the church group that finds itself at...
Mission Committees of churches have a long list of pressing items each time they meet: requests, reports, budgets, evaluations. Lost in all that can be a Mission Committee’s relationship to meeting needs. The second half of Mark’s Gospel records an ordinary day in the life...